


Action and Re-Action

by Mithen



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Episode Tag, First Kiss, First Time, Identity Porn, M/M, Secret Identity, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-15
Updated: 2015-08-15
Packaged: 2018-04-14 19:51:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 23,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4577703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the first issue of <i>Justice League</i> after the reboot, Batman told Green Lantern he had never met Superman before.  This story takes that statement at face value--but what if <i>Bruce Wayne</i> had met him before?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Apogee

**Author's Note:**

> Very belatedly cross-posted from LJ! A slashed-up version of Morrison's post-reboot _Action Comics_ and Johns post-reboot _Justice League_.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Batman told Green Lantern he'd never met Superman before, he meant _Batman_ hadn't. Bruce Wayne, on the other hand...

Bruce Wayne had been trying for some time to find an acceptable excuse to leave the opening night party for the Metropolis Philharmonic, but he hadn't counted on a madman in jeans and a cape crashing through the French doors, grabbing him, and bounding into the night sky.

As ways to ditch a party went, this was one of the more unique, he reflected as Metropolis reeled below him.

Bruce squirmed in the implacable iron grip on his suit, trying to get a good look at his assailant's face--after all, he had come to Metropolis in the hopes of catching even a blurry glimpse of the "inhuman menace terrorizing the city" (in the words of the esteemed _Daily Planet_ ). To be abducted was more than he had hoped for, an opportunity not to be missed.

The leap reached its apogee; for a moment Bruce and the caped nutcase hung together in the night sky and Bruce was able to get a clear look at his face.

To his surprise, it was young--as young as his own, in fact. He had expected a stern and angry scowl, but instead his kidnapper was grinning, savoring the moment where gravity reasserted itself and a leap shifted into a fall.

Then Superman's eyes turned to Bruce's face. The grin slipped away and Bruce realized he had made a rookie mistake: in his eagerness to get a look at this leaping lunatic, he had forgotten to look afraid.

The city rushed up to meet them and Bruce's stomach lurched uncomfortably. This time his clutch at Superman's t-shirt was unfeigned; so far this super-powered anomaly hadn't killed anyone, but Bruce wasn't exactly sure if that was deliberate or just luck.

Booted feet struck the pavement with a sharp _crack_ and chips of concrete scattered; Bruce felt a tiny line of fire sear across his cheek. Then they were back in the air again, the breath jerked out of his lungs once more as the city dwindled below them. 

This time they alighted on the tower of a suspension bridge. Superman held his arms in an unbreakable grip and the river wavered far below them. There were three or four ways out of this if the man decided to drop him, but none of them were very enjoyable.

Superman was staring at him, eyes narrowed. "You aren't afraid."

Bruce felt warmth on his face and realized his cheek had been cut in their insane plunge and was dripping blood onto his flannel suit. He shrugged as well as was possible with feet dangling over nothing but air and water. "What can I say? This isn't the first time I've been swept off my feet by a handsome stranger."

Superman's mouth twitched very slightly, then hardened once more. "You're a very funny man. Does that make it easier for you to live with yourself?"

"My dear Superman, my butler will vouch for the fact that _no one_ can bear to live with me."

This time his kidnapper almost rolled his eyes, although he stopped himself in time. Bruce couldn't help but be fascinated by the man's mobile face, which seemed able to go in a heartbeat from a careless grin to a scowl. _He wears his heart on his sleeve._ "I'm giving you one chance to explain about the Riverside Clinic."

"What about it?"

Superman's face darkened in an instant. "Don't play innocent, Wayne. Your company bought it out in order to turn it into gentrified brownstones for the wealthy." He was really quite magnificent when angry, Bruce couldn't help but notice. "That clinic is the only free clinic in that area of town. Do you know how many people it helps a week? How many children are vaccinated against polio and measles only because of their work? How many HIV tests are done there? Do you even _care_ how many people you're hurting by shutting it down?" He shook Bruce slightly and Bruce's feet waggled back and forth like a demented puppet's. "You'll get on your fancy little cell phone right now and you'll call the project off. Or else--!"

Bruce raised an eyebrow, and the glorious fury on the face in front of him wavered ever so slightly for an instant. _He's never had to deal with a person who doesn't crack immediately,_ Bruce realized. _And he doesn't know what he'll do if I refuse._ He lifted a hand to his breast pocket and got his cell phone out with some difficulty

"I can hear everything the person on the other end says," Superman said, his eyes narrowed. "So don't think of bluffing your way out of this."

"I wouldn't dream of it. Just a second, please," Bruce said as the phone rang. "Hello, Leslie?"

Leslie's voice was small over the phone, but with no sound but the wind around them Bruce could hear her clearly. "Bruce! How nice to hear from you. Why are you calling?"

"Just wanted to make sure that we're still on schedule for the Riverside Clinic project. I have a...let's say an interested party who'd like an update." He winked at Superman, who scowled back at him.

"Everything's going just fine, Bruce," laughed Leslie. "Stop hovering, dear!"

Bruce glanced down, then back up at the man holding him over the edge. "I'm sorry, I just can't seem to help it right now."

Leslie continued: "I talked with Dr. Nam today and he says the densitometer arrived in perfect condition. He's not sure how he feels about those renovations, though. He says he hates to shut his doors for even a couple of weeks."

"Remind him they're not cosmetic renovations," Bruce said. "The asbestos in those old walls can't be good for the patients' health. If he likes, I'll let him work out of an empty office I have in Metropolis for the month. Actually, I'll call him and tell him myself."

"Thank you, Bruce. You're an angel, do you know that? What you've done for--"

"--Yes, yes, it's no problem," said Bruce hastily, cutting off her compliments. They made him uncomfortable, especially when he was fairly sure she wouldn't approve of him spending his nights prowling around and beating up people trying to break into her clinic, among other places. He looked at Superman. "Shall I call Dr. Nam now, or do you have other places to be, other millionaires to threaten?"

Superman's expression was both puzzled and chagrined--really, the man had no poker face at all. "You're not shutting down the clinic?"

"I am not. It appears some inaccurate rumors have started to circulate about my plans for the clinic." _And I suspect I know the source,_ Bruce reflected, remembering Lex Luthor's annoyance when he had been outbid for the crumbling old building.

"Why should I trust you?"

Bruce looked aggrieved. "Superman, I may have a reputation as a cad. I may even be a bit of a lush. But I have no intention of turning wide-eyed moppets out onto the streets without their measles vaccines. I do have _some_ standards."

The handsome face creased in a frown, and then Bruce felt himself lifted almost gently to the metal platform of the tower. The long steel cables of the suspension bridge stretched out below them, singing faintly in the wind, but Bruce was glad to at least have his feet back on something relatively solid. He leaned on the support at the center of the platform. "Are you always so...impulsive?"

Superman was staring at him. The mad exhilaration that had fuelled him seemed to have drained away, leaving him looking tired and a little sad. "You mean angry?"

"Well, maybe." Bruce slid to a sitting position, letting his feet dangle over the edge of the platform into the open air. After a moment, his caped kidnapper did the same. They sat, looking out over Metropolis and listening to the wind. "I've always lived by the saying 'Don't get mad, get even,' myself."

A gusty sigh. "I can't help it, I just get so...I can't just sit back and let innocent people suffer! Someone _has_ to get angry on behalf of the powerless, the helpless. If I can't use these powers to stand up for them, to see the arrogant and mighty laid low, what good am I?"

"You're quite eloquent for an 'anarchistic thug,'" Bruce said, and the man laughed, throwing back his head.

"I liked that one. I like a lot of the ways the papers describe me. 'The Marxist Marauder' was one of my favorites--your own Gotham _Gazette_ , I do believe." He slapped one jeans-covered knee and grinned at Bruce.

Bruce shook his head, looking at the city sprawling beyond Superman's crinkled eyes. "We could do a lot of good together," he said.

He'd expected another laugh. Instead, what he got was a quick flare of anger that wiped the smile from Superman's face and made his eyes glint an odd crimson. "Do you think you can just _buy_ me, Wayne?" he snarled. "I bet you like that, just waving money around and having everyone jump through your hoops like dogs. Well, I'm not for _sale_."

Bruce raised his eyebrows at the fist brandished in front of his face. He could feel his heart pounding, a natural side effect of the fight-or-flight instinct kicking in. But there was nowhere to fly, and fight certainly wasn't an option against this crusading Hercules, so there was nothing for it but to remain calm.

If this "Superman" was the kind of person who'd kill an unarmed man in a fit of anger, the world was probably doomed anyway. 

So he just said in as arch a tone as possible, "I have no intention of purchasing your...services, as tempting as you may be."

There was a long pause, and Bruce felt once again like they were at an apogee, a turning point, hanging together breathlessly. Then the scarlet faded from those angry eyes--and a different scarlet, Bruce was surprised to notice, rose in his cheeks. Superman shook his head, a lopsided smile torn between annoyance and amusement on his face. "I don't understand you," he said. "You're sitting next to a socialist terrorist with nothing but six hundred feet of air between you and the water, and...are you _flirting_ with me, Mr Wayne? Aren't you afraid?"

Bruce swung his feet, looking down. "Maybe I'm an acrophile," he said. "Perhaps I find heights...exhilarating, rather than terrifying. And maybe I am, a little."

"Maybe you're what?"

"Flirting with you," said Bruce.

Superman laughed again, a surprised snort that didn't sound terrifying at all. 

"I meant it, by the way, about working with you. Not hiring you. Working with you."

Superman stood up. "Mr. Wayne, you are without a doubt the coolest customer I've ever dealt with. I don't know if that makes you admirable--or the most heartless person I've ever met." He looked narrowly at Bruce, who looked back expressionlessly, startled at the sting of that last jab. Since when could a hot-headed idealist in jeans get under his skin? "I don't need to work with anyone. How about you just keep up your good work of throwing money at problems, and I keep up my good work of punching people who need sense knocked into them? I'm not made of money, and you don't look like the sort of guy who's used to getting his hands dirty."

Bruce felt a smile that was quite unlike the usual friendly playboy smile stretch his mouth. "Do you mean that metaphorically or literally?"

Superman looked startled. "You're a very strange person," he mused. Then he tilted his head. "The police have spotted us, they're almost here."

"Don't I get an apology for your ruthless abduction of me?"

Superman snorted again. "I'll drop you off--"

"--Oh, don't worry about it," said Bruce. "The party was boring and the view is nice. Plus it'll be good for your vigilante credentials to leave me stranded here." In the distance he could hear faint sirens.

Superman shot him a last, bemused look, then jabbed a finger at him, frowning. "I'll be keeping an eye on you, Wayne." He gathered himself up--now that he wasn't being lugged around, Bruce selfishly enjoyed the spectacle of so many impressive muscles coiling--and sprang into the air, dwindling quickly into a dot on the horizon.

"Oh, and I'll certainly be keeping an eye on _you_ ," Bruce responded when even the dot was gone.

He swung his feet idly in the air, half of his mind making plans for how frightened and cowed to be when the police showed up, the other half of his mind making plans of an extremely different type.

The world had just gotten exponentially more interesting, in more than one way.


	2. Attraction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce Wayne and Superman attempt to figure out what their...working relationship is going to be.

Alfred Pennyworth raised an eyebrow at the television: on the screen a breathless Metropolis news reporter was explaining that billionaire Bruce Wayne had been abducted by the mysterious vigilante known as "Superman." Shaky cell phone footage rolled: a figure crashing through windows and seizing the startled philanthropist-playboy before bounding into the sky.

"An injured and bleeding Wayne was rescued from the top of the Queensland Bridge, safe but clearly shaken," the voice intoned over a clip of a pale and sweating Bruce awkwardly scrambling down off the bridge, helped by solicitous rescue workers. There was a trickle of blood winding its way down from a small cut on his cheek.

"I thought Metropolis was a town of law and order," Bruce said as he ran a shaking hand through his wind-disheveled hair. "I never expected you'd allow dangerous vigilantes to run around unchecked here!" Alfred rolled his eyes as the man on the screen waved off suggestions he should go to a hospital. "No, no, this scratch is nothing. He didn't deliberately injure me at all. He's not that kind of dangerous. No," said Bruce, looking directly at the camera, "It's his _ideas_ that are dangerous. The idea that hard-working entrepreneurs like Mr. Glenmorgan and myself should be 'redistributing the wealth'"--he crooked his fingers to make scare quotes around the term--"is subversive nonsense. This nation rewards hard work, and I say that if Joe Sixpack wants reliable medical care or a retirement pension or good police protection--well, he should do what Mr. Glenmorgan and I have done and put his nose to the grindstone and his shoulder to the wheel."

Someone in the crowd shouted, "Isn't it true that you inherited all of your fortune, Mr. Wayne?" and Bruce looked annoyed. As he waved the question off irritably, Alfred heard the front door click shut and looked up as the man himself hurried into the library. He was loosening his tie with one hand as he shrugged off his suit jacket; he caught caught sight of the news program on the screen and shot Alfred a wolfish grin.

"Spectacular, huh?"

"It was a masterful performance, sir," Alfred agreed.

Bruce shook his head, "Not me, that Superman character. You would not _believe_ how strong he is. When he was carrying me--well, he was almost flying! And not just that, Alfred--he's got charisma." He was pacing the room with long, eager strides, rolling up his shirt sleeves. "You didn't hear him talk. He's got the passion, the empathy to reach out to people, all that stuff I don't have."

Alfred had disagreed with him about his ability to inspire before; Bruce seemed to find charisma a weakness, a dangerous luxury, and insisted he had none. _Perhaps he even believes it,_ Alfred thought, watching Bruce's eyes snapping excitement, the intensity in his face that seemed to seize and gather all the energy in the room. _He's never been on the receiving end of one of his own speeches, after all._

"--could be very beneficial to work with him," Bruce was saying. He was pulling up a handful of screens on his computer, sorting through different stories about Superman, organizing them into color-coded groups, making a flow chart with a fraction of his attention while still talking to Alfred. "Perhaps if I can forge a partnership with him he can divert attention from the Bat, make it possible for me to stay in the shadows for a while longer. The papers aren't going to dismiss those rumors forever; a big flashy crusader who can shrug off bullets might be just the thing to distract them."

"How very pragmatic," Alfred said dryly, watching older footage of Superman: shaking a corrupt banker like a terrier with a rat; grinning as he leapt over a police car; smiling and winking at a camera. "It's a relief to know you aren't tempted to be friends with the man."

"No friends but the Mission," Bruce said briskly, closing a few tabs on the screen and opening others, moving windows around. He hit a button and froze the television screen, cutting off the Metropolis reporter's voice. "You know that, Alfred."

"I do indeed, sir," said Alfred. He left the room to make dinner, wondering if Bruce had realized that he'd left the screen frozen on a close-up of Superman's face, his rakish smile gleaming into the neat, organized library like a challenge.

**: : :**

Searchlights were stabbing the twilight, sending streamers of light across the Metropolis skyline. Superman avoided them, leaping from rooftop to rooftop. His knee hurt, his ribs ached, and he was pretty sure his face resembled a prizefighter's. And not a prizefighter who'd just won a match, either.

It would heal soon, he reminded himself as he jumped from the roof of the public library to Metropolis General Hospital. He healed faster every time. The West River looked free of police boats at the moment, so--

He squinted, focusing, and the tiny figure standing halfway across the Queensland Bridge sharpened into view. Bruce Wayne's perfect pinstriped suit was flattened against his body by the wind off the river, his hair tousled. He was looking out over the water and glancing into the sky, but he didn't jump when a voice came out of the shadows of a girder next to him: "What are you doing here, Wayne?"

"What?" Wayne feigned surprise, his well-groomed eyebrows rising. "I think it's only natural to return here on the one-week anniversary of the day we met. I was hoping I'd meet you again before now, but apparently we run in rather different circles."

"I've been busy."

"Indeed. Saving tenements full of people from wrecking balls, being electrocuted and shot by tanks--and that's just tonight."

Superman felt his eyes narrow. "That was only a few minutes ago. How do you--"

"Oh please." Wayne reached into his pocket and pulled out an iPhone. "I do know how to make Twitter work." He tapped at the screen and Superman heard his own voice yelling, telling people to get out, get to safety, followed by a lot of crashing and explosions. Wayne shuddered elaborately, his eyes on the screen. "You took something of a pounding there. Are you all right?" He peered into the shadows, and Superman grudgingly stepped forward, letting the dim light fall on his face.

Wayne frowned. "I thought you were invulnerable." 

"To bullets. To a lot of things. And I heal fast, if I have enough time between injuries. But I have my limits."

Wayne made a noncommittal murmuring sound and pulled a handkerchief out of his breast pocket, reaching up to dab at the corner of Superman's mouth. Clark caught a faint breath of cologne as the linen touched his face: something clean, like cedar. He reached up and caught Wayne's hand as he pulled the now-bloodstained handkerchief away, meeting the other man's eyes with a frown. After a moment, the corner of Wayne's mouth tilted just a little.

"Ah," he said. "I see."

"I'm not interested in letting someone get a sample of my DNA quite so easily," Superman said.

"For such an honest-seeming, straightforward man, you have quite the paranoid streak," said Wayne. 

"We can't all afford to be relaxed," said Superman, still not releasing Wayne's wrist.

The little smirk at the corner of Wayne's mouth widened into something like a genuine smile. "Actually, I rather approve," he said. He glanced at the handkerchief in his hand, and Superman slowly let go of his wrist. Still smiling, he reached out and tucked the bit of linen into Superman's jeans pocket so that the monogrammed "W" showed. His fingers were cold through the cloth, and Clark wondered how long he'd been standing on the bridge waiting to be noticed. "A memento of our time together," he said.

His voice was light but there was an assessing look in his eyes that Clark couldn't quite gauge and which made him vaguely uncomfortable. The man left him feeling off-balance, and he didn't like it. He crossed his arms and gave his best unfriendly growl: "Enough with the games, Wayne. Did you want to talk to me or not?"

"Have you thought about what I said, about working together?"

"Not particularly, no."

A quick snort of laughter that didn't seem to match his fashion-plate looks. "Well, I have. I'm very serious. You need allies, and I think we have similar goals."

"Oh? Is that why you said I had dangerous ideas?"

Wayne looked annoyed. "I'm hardly going to blurt out my plan to work with you to a pack of newshounds. Just because I don't intend to work with you openly doesn't mean you can't trust me." 

"I don't trust people who aren't honest."

"Oh, I see," Wayne said, spreading his hands out. "That's why you tell everyone your real name and where your powers come from."

"I don't know where my powers come from," Clark said without thinking. There was a pause; Wayne looked, for the first time, honestly surprised. "I really don't. They just...came. Little by little. I was adopted. I don't know who my real parents are." Voices in dreams, speaking a language he almost remembered; shattering crystal and the desolate howl of a dog...

Clark shook his head, frustrated, and realized Wayne was watching him, his face unreadable. "I was teasing, actually. I know you have secrets. You didn't have to tell me that," Wayne said, his voice oddly gentle.

"I...haven't told anyone before today. I have no one to tell, now."

Wayne's eyes flicked to his face, then away. For a long moment, he looked out at the water, and Clark thought maybe he was about to say something. Then he shook his head, once, as if banishing a thought. "They're setting a trap for you," he said, businesslike again. "That building they demolished today--they were trying to lure you in. Luthor was going to use the Riverside Clinic; when I outbid him, he turned to those tenements instead."

"I know." Wayne's eyes came back to his face. "I'm not an idiot. They're testing the limits of my strength, hoping to capture me."

"You should lay low for a while."

"What, I should have let all those people get crushed by a wrecking ball?" Anger flared in Clark again. "I'm not going to just stand by because I know it's a trap. I'm not going to let people die because the government has some crazy vendetta against me."

"They'll interrogate you. Cage you. Cut you apart and see what makes you tick." 

Wayne's voice was low and intense, his eyes suddenly like chips of slate, revealing nothing. He didn't flinch when Superman jabbed a forefinger at him and growled, "No. Innocents. Die. Do you get that, Wayne? Because if you don't, there is no chance of us working together." 

Wayne held Superman's gaze for a long, long moment, and then abruptly smiled.

"So you're saying it's possible there _is_ a chance of us working together?" Clark scowled at him, annoyed at the man's constant shifts of mood, and the grin softened. "No innocents die, Superman. We're on the same page there, I promise you." He held up a finger as if a thought had just occurred to him. "And just in case we _are_ working together, I had the kids in R &D come up with a little something..." He lifted his hand a fraction higher and indicated with his eyebrows the watch around his wrist. 

Clark blinked at it. "That's a Tag Heuer Monaco V4."

An appreciative look. "A watch aficionado as well? I approve once more."

"What about it? I assume you don't think I'll be impressed by a ten thousand dollar watch."

Bruce looked at the watch ruefully. "It's actually more like fifty thousand. Accurate to one hundredth of a second," he added. "But the point is, I've had it modified so it can send out a radio signal at a variety of frequencies. If you were willing to tell me one that your special ears can pick out, I can set it to that. Then if we need to talk I won't have to freeze my behind off on a bridge in the hopes of catching your attention."

"What, some kind of dog whistle? You think I'll come to heel when you call?"

Wayne glared at him, exasperated. "You're free to ignore it. Would you stop assuming the worst of me? I just want to be able to communicate with you, and I didn't think you'd be willing to give me a home address."

"I don't trust you, Wayne."

"You've made that perfectly clear."

"Give me that." Clark grabbed his wrist again and started to adjust the watch; if Wayne had a problem with someone mucking about with his fifty thousand dollar watch he didn't show it. "That should work," he said as he finished the settings. He touched the watch stem and a high-pitched _zee zee zee_ chimed from the watch, far too high for human ears. "Just don't expect me to come whenever you want something heavy lifted or some errands run," he added as he turned it off.

"Darn," said Wayne, looking down at the watch. "I was hoping you'd come over and help me re-arrange the bedroom this weekend. The four-poster bed is _so_ heavy." Clark couldn't help a short laugh at the comedic chagrin in his voice, and Wayne glanced up at him through his lashes. "I assume you wouldn't be up for any other heavy lifting in the bedroom?"

"That's about enough of that," Superman said, scowling once more.

"Enough of what?"

"Enough of the fake-flirting to try and throw me off balance. We both know you don't mean it."

"We do?" There was something muted in Wayne's voice that Clark couldn't read. After a moment, he shrugged, looking back over the water. "Forgive me. It's a reflex, a habit I picked up as a...screen, I guess. If it's any consolation, I only do it to men I know aren't interested."

The dismissive resignation in his voice annoyed Clark almost as much as anything else he'd said in the conversation. "You're so sure you've got everyone neatly pigeonholed, aren't you? You're the most arrogant person I've ever met in my life."

Wayne's eyes flashed to Superman's face once more: no anger in them, only wariness that shifted to disbelief as Clark put his hands on his shoulders and leaned close.

Clark had intended to startle the man with a quick kiss on the mouth, just to make his point, just to wipe some of the certainty from the smooth, cynical face. Just a brief brushing of lips, almost chaste. And for a moment, that was all it was, as Wayne went entirely still, his storm-dark eyes gazing into Clark's from an inch away. Somehow Clark didn't feel like he had made his point, so he kept his mouth against Wayne's lips, glaring back at him.

And then it was--something changed in the kiss, and Wayne was not the least bit still nor the slightest bit pliant, he was kissing Clark back and his mouth was hot, his lips demanding, his tongue--

Clark become aware that his eyes had slid closed at some point and he was pressed up against Wayne's body so tightly he could feel the suit buttons through his t-shirt. He heard a hoarse groan and realized it was him; he heard another and realized it was not. When he felt his own hands beginning to slide down the silky wool as if not under his control, he broke off the kiss and stepped back. He was breathing heavily. He wasn't sure what had just happened. He wanted to find out. He wanted to fly away. He wished he had never stepped forward. He wished he had never stepped away.

"I have to go," he said.

"Yes," said Wayne. "Me too. I have to go." It made Clark feel slightly better that he sounded as bewildered as Clark felt. But only slightly.

Superman glanced down at the water to make sure it was free of police boats. "So maybe I'll--"

When he looked up, Bruce Wayne was gone.

**: : :**

Bruce's hands were steady on the steering wheel as he sped back toward Gotham. This surprised him, as none of him felt steady at all.

 _Idiot!_ he snarled at himself. _Just couldn't resist needling him, just couldn't resist baiting him, could you? And then you couldn't simply have laughed him off, no. You had to kiss him back._ A brief flash of insanely lucid memory--Superman's lips parting, his hands tightening on Bruce's shoulders--and Bruce heard himself make a strangled sound.

"--I don't want to talk about it," he snapped as he came through the door. Alfred closed his mouth and raised his eyebrows, but Bruce was in no mood to discuss the fact that Mr. "No Friends But the Mission" had just made out with Superman on a bridge.

 _Was he just trying to make a point, get me to shut up?_ No--maybe it had started that way, but that had been no feigned reaction. Bruce paced the library like a caged animal, resisting the temptation to curse out loud. How was he going to convince Superman that he wasn't actually attracted to him?

More to the point, how was he going to convince _himself_?

A discreet tap at the door. "Sir?" Bruce stopped pacing and glared at the closed door. As if he could feel the glare--and knowing Alfred, it was possible--the voice went on, "I do hate to interrupt the time you have scheduled for valuable brooding and sulking, but there's something on the news that might be of interest to you."

Bruce picked up the remote and turned on the television. The images sprang out at him: the train, its nose crushed against the _Daily Planet_ building. A dangling arm, red cloth pinned between the train and the unforgiving stone, and Superman's battered face, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. Bruce touched the corner of his own mouth without thinking, feeling the echo of warmth there.

"What happened?" he said to Alfred, who had come into the room as if Bruce had made some sound of distress.

"There was apparently a bomb on the train. He stopped it and saved everyone on board."

There were people in uniforms gathering around the unconscious Superman, guns drawn. They were prying him out of the wreckage, carrying him away. For some reason Alfred was staring at him instead of the screen.

_They'll interrogate you. Cage you. Cut you apart and see what makes you tick._

They had Superman.


	3. Agony

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Superman is captured, Bruce gets a call from the military to help them on a special project.

"I'm always happy to serve my country, General Lane." Bruce Wayne quickened his pace to keep up with Sam Lane, careful to not stride forcefully like the general. "Even if it means getting summoned here so early in the morning and having to cancel several very important meetings." The corridors were narrow and dingy, and Bruce felt a wave of claustrophobia sweep over him. He had a feeling he knew why he was here, and he wasn't at all sure how he felt about that. "So, what can I do to--"

"--Your company has been working on a series of force fields."

"That's true," said Bruce. "For use in medical settings, to contain dangerous--"

"--Well, we have some danger that needs to be contained right here," said Lane, his hand on an industrial-steel door handle. 

As the door started to swing open, Bruce could hear frantic voices beyond: "He's trying to break loose!"

"Give it another hundred thousand," said a calm voice. Lex Luthor. There was a sharp sizzling noise, like static, buzzing through a speaker.

Bruce felt a hand in the small of his back and realized he had frozen in the doorway, unmoving, and Sam Lane was prodding him forward.

On the other side of the door was a room: walls of industrial tiles, sweaty men in white shirts and ties sitting at computers. Lex Luthor presided over it all, his hands on his hips, gazing through a thick window into the next room.

The room where Superman was sitting, strapped to an electric chair.

Rivulets of blood ran from the corners of his mouth down his chin, dripping onto his blue shirt. His hair hung lankly over the straps holding the metal band around his head. Bruce could see his chest rising and falling with each hoarse breath that echoed from the room's speakers. Languid curls of smoke rose from the leather straps binding his arms to the chair. Then his lips skinned back from his teeth in a snarl and he strained against his bonds again. There was a creaking of leather, then a _snap_ as one of them broke.

"Again," said Luthor, his back still to the door, and white electricity arced around the figure in the chair.

Superman's mouth opened in a silent howl, the whites of his eyes showing, all of his muscles rigid as the energy seared through his body.

 _"What--what are you doing?"_ Bruce heard his own voice cutting through the scorching noise. "Are you crazy? That's--that's--!" 

Luthor raised his hand and the electricity went off; Superman slumped in his seat. Luthor turned his head, eyebrow raised, to take in the form of Bruce Wayne, pointing a shaking finger at the bound figure. "Yes?"

"That's--that's the lunatic who kidnapped me!" Bruce stammered, pitching his voice high and panicked. His heart was hammering; he let it drive fear into his words. "You'll just make him angry! He'll--he'll kill us all!"

"It," said Luthor, sounding just a touch peevish. "Not a 'him,' but an 'it.' I'm glad you could make it today." He didn't step forward to offer his hand. "One of our engineers, Mr. Irons, just...tendered his resignation to us. He believed that we were engaging in barbaric practices in our attempt to gather valuable information about this anomalous being. Do you agree that what we are doing is barbaric, Mr. Wayne?"

At the sound of Bruce's name, Superman raised his chin from his chest with an effort, his bleary gaze focusing on the window between him and his tormentors. There were red bubbles of froth at the corners of his mouth. 

For an instant, he met Bruce's eyes.

"Barbaric?" Bruce managed, tearing his eyes from Superman to Luthor. "Why, I should say so! Where in the world did you even _get_ such an outdated piece of equipment as an antique electric chair? Don't you have anything more _reliable_ with which to restrain it?" He was abstractly pleased that he hadn't paused before the pronoun. "Really," he added, looking at General Lane, "I know the military has suffered some budget cuts, but surely you could do better than that when national security--or more importantly, _my_ security--is at stake." Superman's dragging, strained breaths filled the room. Bruce didn't look back at him.

"Do you think Wayne Enterprises can do better?" Luthor said, rubbing his chin with his hand. "We might need a system capable of long-term storage. I'll admit I was hoping that, considering your history with it, you'd be willing to cut us something of a deal." 

Inside the torture room, a man in a full hazmat suit was trying to use a drill on Superman's arm. There was a sharp, acidic whine. _Long-term storage._ "The tissue damage is healing at an astounding rate," a voice came through the speakers.

"Hm," said Luthor. "Okay, let's give it another dose of sarin." There was a hissing noise, and green-gray mist billowed from vents on the floor. Luthor picked up an energy drink from a desk and took a sip. "So what do you think, Mr. Wayne?" he continued to Bruce, his voice as casual as if he were not currently using one of the world's most deadly nerve toxins on a sentient being.

"Wayne Enterprises has some force fields that might do the trick," Bruce said, "But...they're untested against something like this, we have no idea--"

"--Well, that's why we're running this little series of experiments, isn't it?" Luthor replied. He peered through the abating mist at Superman. "To find the best way to neutralize the threat permanently. And maybe to figure out what its long-term goals are, if it has any allies."

A sudden memory: his monogrammed handkerchief tucked into a denim pocket. "Have you searched him?" Bruce asked. "Maybe there are some clues--"

"--Don't tell me how to do my job, Wayne," growled Lane behind him. "Of course we searched him. Nothing but the clothes on his back."

Bruce nodded and looked suitably chastised. Superman must have dropped the handkerchief off in whatever interdimensional pocket universe he spent his time when he wasn't bounding around the city. He glanced back at the nightmare chair. Superman wasn't looking at him anymore. His eyes were closed, and a thread of blood was trailing from one nostril as the gas slowly dissipated.

Luthor gestured to the man in the hazmat uniform, who nodded and picked up a new container. "You," Luthor addressed Superman. "Needles can't pierce your skin. You've just survived another five minutes of exposure to sarin gas. Impressive." Superman made an inarticulate gurgling noise. "Does the word 'krypton' mean anything to you?"

Superman coughed. "Noble...gas," he wheezed. "Number...36..."

"Yes, yes," Luthor said impatiently. "Let us not belabor the obvious. We want to know _why you are here,_ " he snapped, leaning forward. "And if there are more of you. We have your rocket. We know your secrets."

Superman looked bewildered. "...Rocket?" 

Luthor sighed loudly. "My assistant has a drum of hydrochloric acid. We know it can't penetrate your skin, but I'm curious as to what the effects will be if it's placed in your eyes or forced down your throat."

Bruce felt sweat trickling down the small of his back. "Are we even sure the brute can feel pain at all?" he cut in to ask Luthor. "Nothing seems to bother it."

"It's bleeding," Luthor noted. He seemed pleased to have another person who shared his impassivity to suffering with whom to discuss the process. "Blunt trauma and electricity seem to be most effective."

"What about psychological effects?" Bruce pressed. "Have you found a weakness there yet? Something to rattle it, make it reveal important information?"

Luthor cast his eyes upward as if searching for patience. "Of _course_ we have been paying attention to the psychological stresses as well. There's a team of psychologists reviewing all the video, I've done everything short of wheeling in a couch and asking it about its mother."

"Oh, that sounds like it would be interesting," said Bruce, and Luthor gave him a narrow-eyed glare.

"My _point_ is that I intend to understand it from the inside out. Physically, mentally--there won't be an inch or an atom of it that isn't analyzed, believe me. In fact--" Luthor gestured to one of the assistants near the door. "--you're just in time for the next stage in the psychological assay." He spoke to the assistant: "Show it the other one."

"The other one?" Bruce said as three men left the room. "Goodness, are there more of them? What a terrifying thought."

"You'll see," said Luthor. The assistants wheeled a large box, covered with cloth, into the room where Superman was. "Now," said Luthor, looking back through the glass at his captive, "We already know that your appearance is a lie, because the United States government found your rocket, all those years ago. And we found what was inside it, too. Your fellow explorer wasn't as lucky as you, right? Isn't this your _true_ form?" 

The assistant whisked off the cloth with a flourish to reveal a plastic box filled with translucent liquid, and floating within it--

\--Bruce and Superman both blinked at the sight of something like a six-legged goat with a single horn in the middle of its forehead, drifting gently in formaldehyde. Its square-pupiled eyes were popped open in frozen, blank surprise, gazing back at Superman's confused face.

Superman stared at it. It stared back at him. 

And then Superman burst out laughing.

It was a clear, ringing laugh, full of good humor and honest amusement; Bruce found his lips curling involuntarily into a smile at the sound and covered his mouth with his hand, forcing them back into a nervous scowl. 

"I look just like anyone else," Superman informed Luthor, who had crushed his can in his hand. "But I do have to tell you, my eyes don't just absorb radiation like yours do. They can also emit it. Like the microwaves that just cooked your equipment," he added with a smile.

"Shock him!" barked Luthor, gesturing at the technicians. Bruce decided this might not be the best moment to remind him that "it was _it_ , not _him_."

"Dr. Luthor," faltered one of the men at the computers. "Nothing is working..."

There was a sharp metallic _snapping_ noise, and Superman wrenched off the restraints holding him to the electric chair, metal and leather flying everywhere. Bending, he ripped the chair from the floor, hoisting it over his head. "I just needed a--a minute to recover," he grated as he lifted it. He paused for an instant, looking into Luthor's room with a grin. "Lucky for me you talk too much."

Luthor shrieked as the chair came crashing through the glass window, destroying much of the wall in the process. Plaster dust and smoke flew everywhere; in the pandemonium, Bruce felt a forearm close with incongruous gentleness around his throat. He gasped and clawed at Superman's unyielding arm as Luthor and the soldiers gaped at the two of them.

"Shoot him!" yelled Luthor. "Shoot both of them, I don't care!"

 _"Hold your fire!_ " barked Sam Lane at the same moment, and the men froze, waiting.

Superman's breath was hot on Bruce's ear, ruffling the hair at the nape of his neck. "I think you took something that belongs to me," he said, "And I'd like it back." He began to slowly back toward the door, dragging Bruce with him. "Stay there," he warned the soldiers, "Or I swear I'll break his handsome neck."

Together they backed carefully down the empty hall and around a corner. 

Once they were out of sight of the soldiers, Superman dropped Bruce and turned to run.

Bruce ran after him. 

A few corridors later, Superman grabbed his red cape off a wall, laughing as an automated machine guns mounted on the wall spat bullets at him. He turned to see Bruce in the doorway, and his eyes widened. "You followed me," he said.

"I can run pretty fast if I have to," Bruce said. "We've only got a moment before the soldiers catch up, so I have to know--did you mean what you said? About my neck?"

Superman looked down at his cape as he fastened it, not meeting Bruce's eyes. "You don't have to believe me, but I wouldn't have hurt you. I wouldn't have let them shoot you, either, even if Lane hadn't told them to hold their fire."

"No," Bruce said impatiently. "I mean, you think it's handsome? Really?"

Superman's head snapped up and he stared at Bruce. Then he laughed again.

Bruce opened his mouth, but Superman shook his head. "No need to explain," he said. "Thank you. For stalling them, giving me time to heal." Before Bruce could answer he frowned, tilting his head. After a moment, Bruce heard it too: an inhuman voice, chanting, calling. It was coming from a door on the far side of the room.

After a moment's hesitation, Superman squared his shoulders and went to it.

The door opened up into a room, and in that room was a rocket.

It was small, almost delicate, but pulsing with coruscating power, rippling in eddies around the room. It was--singing, there was no other way to put it. Singing in an alien tongue, a song of salutation and homage and joy.

When Superman put out his hand and touched it, crystals formed along it like frost on a window pane, arching spikes rising up to meet him. The song keyed upward in pitch, the waves of power lifting droplets of blood from Superman's face as if in a high wind, but the room was still. His bruised and battered face was reflected a thousandfold in those shining facets, and Bruce could see in his eyes dawning awe and amazement. 

"Protect yourself," Superman murmured as soldiers poured into the room. "I'll come back for you." He was looking at the ship, but as he said it the reflection of his eyes flicked to Bruce for just a moment.

And then he was gone, ignoring the soldiers and their guns, ripping a hole in the wall and disappearing into an elevator shaft, leaving Bruce Wayne standing in a room with a singing alien rocket.

**: : :**

Clark Kent fidgeted with his pen and paper, slouching resolutely in the uncomfortable lobby chair. He'd argued that an interview with Bruce Wayne was a waste of time, but his editor at the _Star_ had insisted he get the "playboy angle" on the "Superman menace." And so here he was, waiting in a polite beige room to talk to the man who he'd kissed the night before.

The man who had watched him be tortured without the flicker of an eyelid.

The man who had helped him escape.

Clark sighed and the secretary cast him a sympathetic glance. He wasn't sure if he was unhappy to be here at all, or frustrated at having to wait. Would Bruce recognize him? No one else had: not Lois, not Jimmy. But maybe Bruce would be the one who could see through his disguise, maybe he would stand up and say "It's _you_." What would Clark do then? Would he lie to him?

 _Could_ he lie to him?

Clark was sure that Bruce had deliberately stalled his torture, giving him just enough time to gather his strength. He just wasn't sure _why_. Everything Wayne did seemed so calculated, so icy. He had stood there and played along with Luthor and Lane, even checking to make sure that handkerchief hadn't linked the two of them, until it was the right time to do something. He had used them like tools.

Was Superman another tool to him? A tool--a _weapon_?--that he could win over with a smile and a kiss?

Looking down at his notebook, Clark wished miserably that telepathy was one of his powers. 

A light on the desk went on, and the secretary touched it, dousing it. She looked up at Clark. "Mr. Wayne will see you now."

"Thank you," said Clark, standing. He had thought he was completely healed from yesterday's events, but maybe not, as his legs felt wobbly.

The heavy walnut door swung open.

On the other side, Bruce Wayne was holding a golf club, practicing his putt into a crystal highball glass and frowning with concentration. He missed by a good four inches.

"Drat," he said. Then he looked up at Clark.

There was no reaction, no glimmer of recognition. He looked politely bored, and Clark felt a gust of relief. 

Relief. That's what it was.

"Mr. Kent, from the _Star_?" Clark nodded, and Bruce held out his hand to shake. His handshake was limp and somewhat damp. He was wearing the signal watch he had showed Superman the day before; Clark remembered the tiny whisper of sound it made, the sound only he could hear. "Sorry to keep you waiting, I had some important business to take care of." Clark swallowed a caustic reply as he picked up the highball glass and put his putter away. "What can I do for you today?"

"We were wondering if you would care to tell us about your encounter with the so-called 'Superman.'" 

Bruce shrugged. "What's to tell? He abducted me from a party, threatened my life, and dumped me off on a bridge. He's a dangerous menace, but I have little further insight on him." 

"I don't mean last week," said Clark, and a tiny line appeared between Bruce's eyebrows. "Two days ago he was taken into custody by the military after being involved in a nearly-fatal train wreck. Isn't it true that yesterday morning a military vehicle picked you up here at Wayne Towers? And isn't it true that Wayne Enterprises is currently working on a new quantum force field system that could possibly be used to contain something like Superman?"

The line had disappeared; Bruce's smile was sunny and unconcerned. "Oh, my secretary told you about the military limo? I was invited to play golf with some very well-connected people, I'm sure you'll understand if I don't want to share any names." He gestured to the golf club in the corner with a look of chagrin on his face. "I lost quite badly, that's why I'm practicing today. I guess I've gotten rusty. They did ask me about the new force fields," he added helpfully, "Along with some other things. My goodness, do you think they could be of use in containing the Marxist Metropolitan Menace?"

His heartbeat hadn't altered at all; the man was the most accomplished liar Clark had ever met. Clark forced his voice to stay steady and professional in turn. "I just thought that maybe, since you'd seen him face to face more than most people, they might have called you in to identify the corpse." Bruce's smile vanished, but his face remained politely attentive, slightly curious. "Or are they not done running tests on him yet? Did you help them out there as well?"

There was a silence in which Bruce's long, manicured fingers drummed briefly on the mahogany desktop as he looked at Clark. Then he took a newspaper off the desk and unfolded it, holding the headline out for Clark to see: **Superman Escapes** , by Lois Lane of the _Daily Planet._

"I believe you've gotten scooped," Bruce observed. His heartbeat was slightly faster now, Clark noticed. He put the paper down and took two steps closer to Clark, stopping a few feet away, his hands clasped behind his back. "And I recommend that you would be better off keeping up with your colleagues at the _Planet_ than asking ghoulish questions about illegal torture and detainment."

"He's not a U.S. citizen, is he?" Clark pressed, feeling reckless and angry. "In that case--"

"--You may put me down on record as being opposed to the military-sponsored torture of even the most dangerous outlaws and vigilantes," Bruce said. "I don't believe that is a terribly controversial position. Or it shouldn't be." His heartbeat had evened back out and he looked at Clark with unflappable calm, a slight smile back on his face. "And that is all I'm going to say to you, Mr. Kent." There was a pause. "The door is behind you. Anna will show you out."

He turned his back on Clark and picked up his putter as if the room were completely empty.

After a moment, Clark turned and left.

**: : :**

The sound of grunts and impacts met Alfred's ears as he descended the makeshift wooden stairs into the cave beneath the Manor. There was little there but some work benches and exercise equipment: they couldn't move the computers down until the humidity was more under control.

In a rubble-strewn corner of the cave, Bruce Wayne was pummeling a punching bag, still wearing his dark blue wool suit from work. His hair was dripping with sweat and the jacket was soaked through in places. A seam had split and Alfred could see the white shirt showing through.

"Oh dear," said Alfred. Bruce turned at the sound of his voice, breathing heavily, his eyes glassy. "Couldn't you have at least changed out of the Armani first?"

"What?" Bruce looked down at himself with dull surprise. "Oh." He started stripping out of the suit, letting the tailored clothing drop in crumpled heaps to the ground. "I'm going out."

"Again, sir? Two nights in a row...you said you didn't want anyone noticing a pattern."

Bruce made a hoarse sound. "I have to punch someone," he gritted. "Preferably someone bald."

"Oh dear," Alfred said again, casting his eyes up toward his own receding hairline. "Would I do, sir? It's safer."

Usually a line like that would elicit at least a wry sliver of a smile, but Bruce just shook his head as if he were attempting to dislodge images from it. "Someone who's hurting someone. I need to hurt them back," he muttered. "Not just...stand there."

"Master Bruce," Alfred said.

"I just stood there while they were torturing him," Bruce said. He was pulling on his dark clothes, the heavy boots, the leather gloves. "And then that damned reporter today--he wanted all the juicy details, the sadistic bastard. I wanted to throw him across the room. But I smiled, and smiled, and _smiled_." He spat the words like they tasted foul. "And so," he said, looking at Alfred with shadowed eyes, "I am going out tonight. And I am finding someone who is hurting someone, and I am punching them. I am punching them very hard."

"Master Bruce," Alfred called as Bruce pulled on his mask and stalked toward the stairs. Bruce stopped, but didn't turn around, all the lines of his body tense and coiled. "Have you considered...adding a cape to your costume? That Superman chap seems to pull it off well."

Bruce turned his head; Alfred caught a gleam of midnight-blue eyes through the mask, a hint of a smile. 

And then he was gone into the night.

**: : :**

Clark sat down on the edge of his bed with a sigh. He had thought he had healed, but he still felt bruised on the inside. A day of work and leads and almost nothing to show for it.

He reached into his pillowcase and pulled out the monogrammed handkerchief from where he'd hidden it before going out to meet with Jimmy the night before. Before getting hit by a train. Before...

The square of linen still smelled of cedar and bergamot, clean and spare and light.

Beneath that, Clark could smell--faintly--motor oil and leather. Salt. Sweat.

He put it aside with a frown, remembering expressionless dark eyes glimpsed through glass, and lay down.

Bruce's scent lingered on the pillowcase and followed Clark into dreams filled with electricity and rocketsong.


	4. Analysis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Superman shows up on the doorstep of Wayne Manor to return something of Bruce's.

"Master Bruce."

Bruce groaned and lobbed a pillow in the direction of the voice at the door, burying his head under a spare. His knee ached where he'd landed on it badly the night before, his knuckles felt bruised, and he wanted to relive just one more time the moment where that would-be rapist had seen the fist coming at his face, the look in his eyes.

"Master Bruce, I believe you'll want to get up right away. We have a...guest who wishes to speak to you."

This time the strain in Alfred's voice penetrated Bruce's morning fog; he raised his head and blinked at him. "Someone at the gate?"

Alfred was holding the pillow like a silver serving tray, but his face was worried. "No, sir. That's the problem."

**: : :**

"This is _trespassing_ , you know," seethed Bruce fifteen minutes later, glaring at the man in jeans and a cape standing on his front doorstep. He could tell his hair was still in disarray and he hadn't had time to put his shoes on, but his embarrassment over his appearance was nothing compared to the cold fear in his stomach at having a walking x-ray machine with super-hearing at his door. He wasn't ready, he wasn't ready for this, it had never occurred to him that Superman would just walk up to his front door and stand there looking like any normal person (in a cape). _Don't show uncertainty. Glower_.

Bruce glowered.

Superman crossed his arms. "At least I rang the doorbell. I could have just walked in, you know." 

Bruce knew all too well. "Why are you here?"

Superman held out a neatly folded bit of linen, the elaborate monogrammed "W" on top. "I thought I'd better return this. Seeing as you were so worried about its whereabouts back in Luthor's lab."

 _Oh._ Bruce looked down at the freshly-laundered handkerchief, then back up at Superman's tight, impassive features. "It was a gift," he said lightly, trying to smile. "Keep it."

"I'm not sure you want me to have gifts from you. Especially ones that could link us." 

"I trust you to keep it safe," Bruce said. When the wariness didn't fade from Superman's face, he managed a laugh. "I should think you'd be the one that's reluctant to be connected to me. The hero of the common man, associating with a wealthy parasite?" He shook his finger in Superman's face playfully. "It would ruin your reputation." It was surprisingly hard to keep the light-hearted persona in place right now, for some reason. A memory flicked through his mind: the feel of Superman's mouth on his, the warmth of it. He banished the thought back to the corners of his mind where it belonged.

Superman was frowning past him into the shadows of the foyer. "You have a point, actually. Who was it that answered the doorbell--do you really have a _butler_? What is this, _Upstairs Downstairs_?"

Bruce heard an indignant sniff from behind him. "Yes, that was my butler. Alfred Pennyworth. He's an old friend of the family."

Superman's eyebrows lifted. "I have old friends of the family too, but I don't usually put them to work answering my doorbells and fetching me food."

Bruce's uncomfortable indignation vanished at the hint of self-disclosure. "Wait, you have a family? Did more of you come here? That was an awfully small rocket. How did you and that alien goat-thing both fit in it, or are there more rockets? I thought you said you didn't know where you come from," he finished up, then realized he hadn't taken a breath in between questions when Superman held up his hands as if to surrender, a lopsided smile on his face.

"I don't know a lot of those answers yet," said Superman. "I really don't."

Bruce nodded. "I understand if you don't trust me. That's your prerogative. I just...would really like to know more. About you."

Superman hesitated. He glanced down at the handkerchief in his hand, then back at Bruce.

"And I mean it about the handkerchief," said Bruce. "If you don't want to keep it, feel free to burn it or whatever. But I don't like to take things back once I've given them."

Something flickered in Superman's eyes, and Bruce remembered once again the tremor in those strong muscles as they had pressed against him. "I don't either," said Superman. He tucked the handkerchief back into his jeans and met Bruce's gaze. "I'll answer what questions I can, but I'd...rather not do it on your doorstep."

There was a challenge in his voice, the same tone of challenge there had been on the bridge. After a moment, Bruce stepped backwards and opened the door wider. "Have you had breakfast? Alfred makes a fantastic waffle."

**: : :**

"--So the government got the rocket, but your parents got you away in time?"

Superman finished off his third stack of waffles from his spot next to Bruce at the morning room table. "These are _so good_ ," he said to Alfred. "Thank you." Alfred's nod was polite, but Bruce knew that complimenting his cooking was sure to thaw him. "That's what my parents always told me," Superman said to Bruce.

"You were raised as human." Of course he was, Bruce thought. There was no way he'd seem so comfortable with human norms and culture if he'd arrived here recently. "Then what was that goat-thing they showed you?"

"I don't know," Superman said. "My parents never mentioned there being anything else in the rocket. Maybe that's what my race really does look like, and I just...unconsciously shape-shifted or something to match the first beings that found me."

He said it lightly, but Bruce could hear dark chasms of worry yawning underneath the words. He leaned forward and slapped Superman on the forearm, hard enough to make a sharp sound. Superman blinked at him. "Doesn't matter," said Bruce. "This is what you are now."

"Maybe you just don't want to imagine that you kissed a mutant goat-being."

Bruce assumed his most dignified air, mostly to cover up for the fact that he hadn't expected Superman to be the one to bring the kiss up again. "I'm sure that if your true form were a six-legged goat, you'd be a dashingly handsome six-legged goat and I would still have no regrets."

Superman looked down at his plate--remarkably as if he were flustered, but that seemed unlikely. "You haven't mentioned that this means I have a human name, a human identity," he said in a low voice.

"No, I haven't," agreed Bruce. He shrugged. "I don't think you need to have a name to know someone. Names are just labels. We are who we make ourselves into."

Superman's gaze was assessing. "And who have you made yourself into?"

Bruce spread his hands wide. "Who do I seem like to you?" It was a rhetorical question; he didn't need to know the answer.

He wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.

"You seem..." Superman looked around the sunny morning room, out at the whitecap-flecked sea out the bay window, at the silk brocade wallpaper. He looked back at Bruce's face. "You seem like a lot of things. You're brave and smart, you lie with the skill of a sociopath, you can watch someone being tortured and make jokes, and then risk your life to help them. I don't..." He shook his head, and there was something like pain in his eyes. "I don't understand you."

He didn't need to be understood, Bruce chastised the pang under his breastbone. "I know."

"But I like you," Superman added. He reached out with one finger and touched the back of Bruce's hand where the morning sunlight fell across it, a whisper-light brush across the knuckles that seemed to send a shock of sunlight through Bruce's body like a thread of gold. "We both have our hidden places," he said as Bruce struggled to keep his face calm. "Can we maybe...both accept that? I won't push if you won't." His finger stalled at Bruce's last knuckle, paused on that last ridge of bone. Superman was looking at Bruce's hands so intently that Bruce wondered if he was using some special vision on him, looking under the skin or into his molecules. Some kind of radiation causing these waves of heat shivering across his body, focused on that point of contact between finger and hand, that one bright point. "I just... haven't ever met someone like you before," said Superman.

"Says the super-strong alien," said Bruce.

"But I'm just an average person, really," said Superman. "Look at me." He gestured to his jeans and t-shirt. "I'm just some guy in boots who can jump high."

"Whereas I am an unrepentant hedonist who lounges all day in my bare feet." Bruce swung one of the feet at issue up into the air between them, waggling the toes--

\--and Superman caught it between his hands like a butterfly or soap bubble, holding it with his thumbs pressed gently into the arch.

"Oh," said Superman after a moment, "That makes your heartbeat react." He let Bruce's bare foot lower until it was resting on his jeans-clad knee, his hands still wrapped around it. Warm hands. Strong.

Belatedly, Bruce realized he hadn't responded yet. "You can...hear my heartbeat?"

Superman's thumbs were moving along his instep, almost stroking it. "I can." The coarse fabric under his foot was warm, and his toes were resting on Superman's upper thigh. Muscles as strong as stone, something you could push off from and fall endlessly. Superman's fingers pressed a little harder, and Bruce's toes curled helplessly against the blue cloth. "Your hands aren't soft," Superman said. "You have callouses that aren't from holding a pen. These are not the feet of a man who has been chauffeured everywhere his whole life."

Anger sparked along Bruce's jawline, and he yanked his foot away. "I thought you said we weren't going to push." 

"I'm not pushing," Superman said. "I'm just...admiring." But the moment was gone; he made no attempt to keep Bruce from pulling his foot back. "I'd better be going," he said, standing up. His mouth tilted in a slight smile. "Thank you for the handkerchief. I'll keep it safe."

Bruce stood as well, walking with him to the door. "You'd better--you don't want to be linked with me."

Superman turned at the door, his smile caught somewhere between mischievous and wistful. "Are you so sure?" 

And then he was gone before Bruce could reply, running down the driveway in a deer-fast lope, leaping over the gate in a single bound and out of sight.

Bruce stood in the doorway, his bare feet cold and aching, until Alfred came to check on him.

**: : :**

The feel of Bruce Wayne's sinewy foot in his hands was, as it turned out, the best part of Clark Kent's day. By the time he returned to Metropolis, Superman was all over the news, his face plastered with angry banners: _Alien go home!_ and _Menace from Beyond?_ There were protests, furious people waving signs. Snarky newscasters with cynical smiles making jokes about flying saucers and anal probes. Clark resolved to ignore them all, put on the cape after work and went out.

The next day it was worse. The protests were bigger, more angry. It seemed a lot of people really hated him. Clark sat on his sagging bed and stared at his flickering television screen, watching the news cycle over and over. _Stop watching_ , said a voice in his head. It sounded like his mother's. _You'll just make yourself miserable._

He couldn't seem to turn off the television. Late into the night he sat in its merciless glow, bathed in silver vitriol.

The next day he woke up tired, and his eyelids felt like sandpaper. He rubbed at them and put his boots on, fumbling with the laces, fastening his cape with clumsy fingers.

That was the day a crowd started throwing bottles at him.

**: : :**

The t-shirt made a satisfying _thump_ as he threw it into the trash can; the work boots made an even more satisfying _bang_ as they followed. Clark sat on the edge of the bed, his parents beaming down at him from the photograph on the desk. _Dear Ma and Pa, I miss you so much. Love, your son the failure._ He lay down and stared at the ceiling, remembering dark blue eyes and a slanting smile. What would Bruce Wayne think when Superman disappeared? Would he be disappointed? Would he be worried the government had eliminated him? Would he think, _I knew he'd give up_?

Should Clark find some way to tell him he was alive, at least?

His eyes traced a water stain on the ceiling. Maybe he'd rather have Bruce think he was dead than find out he'd quit.

Clark closed his eyes against the pain of that thought.

 _Zee zee zee_.

It was a tiny sound, a whisper like gossamer wings at his ear, but impossible to mistake for anything else.

 _Zee zee zee_.

Clark covered his eyes with his forearm. He didn't want to talk to Bruce Wayne, didn't want to see him.

What if he was in danger?

 _Zee zee zee_.

What if the government had figured out he wasn't entirely loyal to them, that he was playing some kind of end game of his own? What if Luthor had him in a room somewhere, tied to some torture chair, oozing that smile all over him?

 _Zee zee zee_.

Clark sat up, staring wildly down at his bare chest. He looked over at the trash can, one corner of blue cloth sticking out of it.

_Zee zee zee._

Thirty seconds later he was dressed and on his way, his boots thudding on the road as he ran.

**: : :**

The butler opened the door, his face impassive. Clark waved a little feebly, feeling that maybe he hadn't made the best impression last time. "Mr. Pennyworth, right?" The butler nodded. "Is Bruce...is Mr. Wayne okay?"

"Master Bruce is as 'okay' as he ever is," the butler said. "He was eager to see you. He said he...had a clue."

As Clark was ushered into the library, he realized that "eager" was an understatement. "Superman!" Bruce exclaimed as the door opened looking up from a computer screen, the planes of his face like a banked fire, glowing. "You came. Good. Come here." He gestured peremptorily to the computer screen, and Clark moved to look at it, casting a dubious eye on Bruce's intense expression.

On the screen five different windows were open: Clark saw "Say No to Alien Overlords!" and "Illegal Alien" signs frozen in mid-wave. Clark felt a rush of anger, mixed with defensive embarrassment--had Bruce called him here to join in the heckling? He opened his mouth to snap something, he wasn't sure what, but Bruce was already talking, not even noticing his reaction.

"Look at this. Look what I found." He reached out and grabbed Clark's shoulder, shaking him as though his triumph couldn't be contained. "These are five of those protests, scattered around Metropolis. Look." Rapid mouse clicking; a portion of each screen enlarged, zoomed closer. "Here. And here. And here again. The same guy at all of them."

"Sure," Clark said, "I remember him, he was in the tenement that I saved from the wrecking ball. I guess he blames me."

"Blames you so much he'd go out of his way to be at every single protest?"

"According to him, I left him homeless," Clark muttered, looking away from the man's angry face. "I suppose he's got plenty of time free to protest."

"Really?" Bruce pulled up another window: grainy footage shot from a cell-phone camera. Clark saw himself being shot by a tank, on all fours in front of it. A man jumped between him and the tank, yelling and waving his arms, shielding Superman with his body.

"Enough!" The man's voice was hoarse but clear. "This guy just saved our lives! My kids! What the hell is _wrong_ with you people?"

Superman watched as the man turned his back on the tank to help Superman up. "Get outta here," he said, brandishing a fist at the looming tank. "We'll cover ya."

"That's the guy who, a week later, is calling for your head?" Bruce said as the Superman on the screen leaped into the air and the people on the ground cheered.

Clark shrugged. "People can change their minds."

Bruce made an exasperated noise in his throat. "Then tell me where a penniless homeless guy got the boots he's wearing," he said, enlarging one of the protest images. "He was wearing sneakers the night he lost his home."

"So he got new boots."

"Those are brand-new Timberland work boots. Sturdy. Well-insulated. Not flashy but durable. They run about two hundred dollars a pair." He looked over at Superman, and there was a steely satisfaction in his eyes that did strange things to Clark's stomach. "Don't you see? Someone's paying off this guy to badmouth you!"

Clark managed to tear his mind from thoughts of how kissable Bruce Wayne's mouth was when it was set in fierce determination. He looked at "Streets" Bowman's face on the screen. "I guess that would be Glenmorgan's style," he admitted.

"He's guilty," Bruce said.

"Sure, he's as corrupt as they come--"

"--No, I mean Bowman," said Bruce. "And I mean he _feels_ guilty. Listen to his voice, watch his face."

 _"Mr. Glenmorgan offered us real hope for the future and fresh accommodations!"_ Bowman was saying. Bruce froze the screen again.

"Look at the lines of strain around his mouth, the way he looks down when he says 'hope.' He pulls it back together almost immediately, but his microexpressions aren't angry, they're guilty." Bruce tapped the computer screen between Bowman's eyes: _gotcha_. His own expression was nearly gleeful, all of his being focused on his prey. Clark had a sudden image of Bruce sitting in this library, watching protest footage for hours on end, those keen eyes scanning the screens, hunting for proof that the protests were insincere, rigged. That the people of Metropolis hadn't abandoned Superman on their own. Clark felt a sudden tightness in his throat and had to swallow hard.

At the sound, Bruce looked over, the predatory delight in his eyes shifting to his more usual irony. "I just...was wondering," he said awkwardly. "Why people would get so angry at you, so suddenly." A lopsided smile. "Besides, as a parasitic billionaire, I have a fair amount of spare time. Don't I, Alfred?"

"Indeed, sir." Clark started; he hadn't heard the butler come in. Was it that the man was that quiet, or was it that Clark was that distracted? "You are among the idlist of the rich."

There was irony in the English accent, irony and--Clark was surprised to hear--affection. Clark looked back at the screen of Bowman's uncomfortable face. "I appreciate all the work you've done. I really do. It...helps. A lot."

"What will you do now?" Bruce asked briskly.

"Do? I guess I'll go back to Metropolis," Clark said.

"But...what will you do about Bowman being paid off?"

Clark shrugged. "Nothing? If it gets him and his kids better clothing, how can I blame him?" Bruce gaped at him. "It doesn't matter," Clark said, only realizing as he said it that it was true. "As long as I know that the protests are at least partially fake, that makes the difference. I can keep going."

After a moment, Bruce nodded. He turned to the butler. "Alfred, could you maybe--"

"--bring the two of you some coffee, sir?" A polite nod. "It is brewing as we speak."

Bruce smiled after him as he left the room, then glanced at Clark out of the corner of his eye "Will you stay for coffee?"

"I think I have the time."

Bruce stood up and threw himself onto the wide leather sofa, which sighed under the weight of his body, settling. "I hope you don't mind me calling you like that," he said, closing his eyes. "Maybe we should come up with a way to communicate by voice, so I don't sound like I'm summoning you." He yawned hugely and gestured toward a chair. "Have a seat." He yawned again, then grimaced. "Sorry. Long night. Don't mean to be...rude."

By the time Clark took a seat his hand was dangling limp, almost to the floor; his breaths slowed, evened out.

"Oh my." Clark looked up to see Alfred standing in the door with a coffee tray. "Master Bruce has been reviewing that footage for a while," he explained, sounding apologetic.

"It's no problem," Clark said. "He looks like he could use the sleep." He stood up. "Would you tell him again how much I appreciate all he's done to help?"

"I'm sure he wouldn't mind if you stayed," Alfred said.

"I really ought to get back. I've got to patrol," Clark said. He felt suddenly restless, eager to get back to his city, to leap from building to building once more.

"At least take some cookies," protested Alfred as Clark started to leave.

Moments later, Superman was bounding effortlessly toward Metropolis, a cookie in each hand and one in his mouth. Chocolate chip: his favorite.

**: : :**

He was typing at his desk through lunch break the next day when a murmur through the _Star's_ bullpen caught his attention. Someone turned up the volume on one of the televisions lining the wall, the one with "Streets" Bowman's pale face on it.

"--paid me money to speak out against Superman," Bowman was saying. There was an excited rustle and a dozen microphones seemed to be jousting to catch his voice. "No, I don't know who exactly," Bowman said in response to a shouted question. He looked down, then back up at the camera. "I wanted to apologize to Superman. He saved my family's life, and he deserved better than to be slandered by me. I'm so sorry." He managed a wan smile. "I might not have a home, but I can sleep better now with a clean conscience."

Clark sat at his desk, his instant ramen cooling unheeded, watching Bowman talk. "Superman Protester Recants," read the crawl. The conference ended and the coverage moved to talking heads discussing what difference this revelation might make in the public's perception of Superman.

Clark turned back to his work, his spirit somehow lighter. He'd been willing to keep going, but he was still glad Bowman had had a change of heart, for whatever reason. He typed a little faster, careful to keep it within normal human speed.

He was eager to get back out to helping people.

**: : :**

"You seem pleased with yourself, sir," Alfred observed as Bruce turned off the television.

Bruce was quite pleased, as a matter of fact, but contented himself with a smirk, picking up a fresh mug of coffee. He hadn't even had to intimidate Bowman much at all: the man had seemed almost relieved when confronted by a faceless shadow in an alley, eager to confess and make amends. A good man in a tough spot. Bruce made a mental note to see if there was a place for him at Wayne Enterprises--in a couple of months, long enough to not look suspicious.

"I still don't know why you didn't wake me up before Superman left," he grumbled.

"You needed the sleep," Alfred said primly.

"Do you disapprove of him?"

If Alfred was surprised at the apparent change of direction, he didn't show it. He pondered the question for some time. "I find him good-hearted, but rather rash and far too reckless for his own good." He looked narrowly at Bruce. "I would say you and he were something of a good match."

"As crime-fighting partners?"

"As partners, yes," Alfred shot back impeturbably.

Bruce took too hasty a gulp of coffee and attempted to look placid and bland as it scalded his mouth. Alfred smiled with the air of a person who has won an argument, leaving the room in triumph.

Bruce sighed and blew on his coffee, eyeing his watch as if it were tempting him. No, he couldn't just call up Superman every day without a good reason.

No, wanting to see that smile again was _not_ reason enough, he reminded himself sternly.


	5. Abduction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Metropolis is under attack--and Superman is appalled to find Bruce right in the middle of it all.

Nothing major had changed in Metropolis: one man recanting his accusations was hardly enough to convince the whole city to turn around and embrace Superman. There were still protests, still angry faces on the television and on the streets. But when someone screamed "alien!" at him, Clark was able to remember Bowman's apology and just keep moving. When a snide news commentator suggested that the world would be better off without freaks in capes, he remembered Bruce Wayne's gleeful grin and changed the channel with a shrug.

"I haven't given up yet," he told the picture of his parents, his hands gentle on the worn frame. "Thanks for believing in me. I think--I think I've found some people here who believe in me too." He thought of Lois Lane's fierce news stories defending Superman, Jimmy's bemused friendship.

Bruce Wayne's passionate eyes and wry smile. Bruce's strong, calloused hands and the feel of his tongue in--

Clark put the picture down hastily, as if his parents could read his thoughts through his touch on the picture frame. He wasn't sure how his parents would have reacted to Bruce Wayne, or the idea of their son kissing him. His wealth and status probably would have bothered them more than the fact he was a man, though.

 _I just want what every mother wants--for her child to be happy,_ his mother had said in an elliptical but affectionate conversation, prompted perhaps by noticing the way Clark looked at the leading man in the high school play. _I just hope someday you can find a person who really understands and accepts you, who knows your heart and loves you as you deserve to be loved._

Clark sighed as he pulled on his hoodie. The strange thing was, he began to feel like Bruce Wayne understood him better than anyone else: his doubts and hopes, the things that made him angry. The things that inspired him to fight.

Bruce didn't even know his name.

 _We are who we make ourselves into._. What was he making himself into? What was _Bruce_ making himself into? And could they do it together?

Clark pulled his thoughts back to the here and now. He had an interview with the owner of the Factory for Tomorrow in an hour. Time to stop daydreaming about handsome millionaires and start preparing for some hard-hitting investigative journalism.

_: : :_

"Hard-hitting journalism," he thought a few hours later, wasn't usually quite so _literal_.

The robot reeled back from Superman's punch, emitting a high-pitched squeal that made his teeth hurt. The factory owner was gibbering as his factory turned against him, Clark's ears were filled with a deafening clatter announcing that Earth would be stored and preserved, and at least Lois and Jimmy were on their way back into the relative safety of the city. Superman lashed out, crushing another robotic arm into scrap, whirled--

And saw out of the corner of his eye Bruce Wayne standing at the end of the Queensland Bridge.

Clark froze for a second and the robot landed a good punch on the side of his jaw. Staggering, he blinked tears out of his eyes and the figure in an immaculate cashmere coat resolved back out of blurriness. Bruce was directing traffic over the bridge; as Clark stared he broke off to scoop up a little girl and help her into her mother's desperate arms in the back of a fleeing pickup truck. He wasn't even looking at Superman. 

The robot was pulling on his cape now. Superman whirled, seized it, and hurled it into the bay. He stared around for more attackers, but the robots were walking off now, droning about gathering artifacts. At least they were ignoring the steady stream of people. "Bruce!" yelled Superman, leaping over the _Planet_ news van to get to him. "What are you doing here?"

Bruce frowned at him and finished helping a scooter clear a path and flee into the city. "I guess this is our bridge, isn't it?" he said. "I mean, three meetings here in two weeks, it must be destin--"

He broke off as Superman grabbed his arm. "You're in danger here, you have to get out," Superman said, urgency making his teeth click together on the consonants. "Get into the city, where you'll be safe."

That maddeningly careless grin. "I just came in for a meeting, and found myself in the middle of all this!" He turned to gesture at the marching robots. "It's quite exciting-- _hey!_ "

Superman swept Bruce up, ignoring his protest, and bounded over cars and trucks to the far end of the bridge, into Metropolis city. He was going to get Bruce to--

"Put me down," said a quiet and icy cold voice. "Right now."

Superman stopped, blinked, and put Bruce down. "But--you're bleeding." He hadn't seen it until Bruce turned his head a moment ago, but there was a long gash over his right ear; blood spattered the creamy collar of his jacket, dripping slowly from the dark hair.

Bruce raised a hand to his ear, then peered at his red-stained fingers, his expression vaguely surprised. He looked back up at Superman, and his gaze was clear, direct, and devoid of any good humor whatsoever. "Get this through your skull--you do not pick me up like a load of laundry and carry me away from where I have chosen to be, where I need to be. Ever."

There were shouts from the other side of the bridge, far behind them. "I'm sorry," Superman gasped, backing away toward the sound, still staring at him. "It's just--you're the only person who seems to _understand_ me, and I can't bear the thought of you--of you--" He touched the bloody stains on Bruce's shoulder, then leaned forward without thinking and pressed his lips briefly to Bruce's fierce, tense mouth. "My name is Clark," he whispered. "I just wanted you to know." 

Then he whirled and ran away from Metropolis, toward the sounds of battle, not daring to look back.

**: : :**

_Clark._

A car honked at the idiot standing in its way, and Bruce Wayne moved to the side of the bridge, still staring after the caped figure heading away toward the mainland. Superman's name was Clark. 

Wasn't that reporter who had come to see him--

Was that _possible_?

Bruce tried to summon a memory of Clark Kent of the _Daily Star_ and discovered that beyond a vague impression of horn-rimmed glasses and clumsiness, nothing about the man had stayed in his memory. This alone was so shocking--that a man trained in detection and analysis wouldn't remember a face--that Bruce found himself stunned into wild surmise.

Far off, he could see Superman fighting with a robot even bigger than the others before it. This one seemed to have a human face. Bruce took a step toward the mainland, then two. Cars inched by him, honking, their occupants cursing or weeping. He didn't notice them.

He could help Superman. Even without his belt of gadgets, he knew he could help. But only as Bruce Wayne. He had no mask, no way to hide his identity. He'd have to reveal all his training, come out into the open and operate in the light, throw away all his plans.

_My name is Clark._

Superman was huddled on the ground, his cape held up like a fragile shield against a hail of death. 

_You're the only person who seems to understand me--_

He was running now, his steps coming faster, not bothering to look awkward or winded. In the distance, blows were falling like rain on Superman's head and shoulders.

_I can't bear the thought of you--_

He vaulted over a motorcycle, ignoring a cry of protest. He was almost to the fight, already working out angles of attack in his head. He could cut loose that banner above the street, blind the android for a second, buy Superman--buy _Clark_ \--a little time to recover, and then--

Running at full speed toward Superman, he slammed into an invisible barrier.

He reeled backwards, his ears ringing with the force of the impact, then flung himself forward again in shocked disbelief, only to be repulsed once more. There was a strange humming noise in the air. He could hear people screaming, but the sound of the battle between Superman and the robot was strangely muted. He reached out until his hand encountered the barrier: transparent and unyielding. Cutting him off from the mainland. Cutting him off from Clark.

As Bruce Wayne stared, the world beyond the barrier swelled into gigantic proportions. The distant figures of Superman and the robots became Titans framed against a nightmare skyline. Then there was a sickening vertigo in the pit of Bruce's stomach, a sense of blurring transition as they shot upward, stars fading into existence as the blue was leached from the sky.

There was a spaceship looming above them--a ship the size of the Eastern seaboard. It dwarfed Metropolis entirely, too large to process. All around him, people fell to their knees, crying out and weeping. Bruce could feel his nails cutting into his hands as his mind reeled, grappling with the change in scale. No. The ship wasn't huge. Superman hadn't become a giant.

Metropolis--and all the people inside it--had become tiny.

A hatch opened above them, gaping wide to swallow the city. So smoothly that nothing was jarred, Metropolis was placed on a stand. 

A terrifying silence fell across the city, broken only by distant sirens and the sound of sobbing.

Bruce stepped forward, his hand out until he encountered the barrier again. It felt different now. Harder. Colder. Like glass. Beyond it, distorted and looming, he could see the vague shapes of other bottles, other cities with delicate fluted spires or squat honeycombed structures.

"Planet 205 survivors," announced a voice like static and ichor, coming from all around them. "You have been filed and preserved. In one hour, the process will be complete and irreversible."

They were in the vacuum of space, perhaps beyond the exosphere. Far beyond the reach of a man who could leap even tall buildings. A man who was perhaps dying, pummeled to death far below, as the alien voice continued reassuringly:

"Welcome to the collection."


	6. Appeal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Metropolis (and Bruce in it) have been miniaturized and kidnapped into space. Superman intends to reach them--even though he can't fly.

"I've always known Superman was a magnificent mountain of a man," murmured Bruce Wayne as Lois Lane glared at him, "But this is taking it a bit too far."

Superman towered over the city of Metropolis, looming into the sky like a Colossus. He reached out to touch the glass trapping the city, and people cried out in terror and supplication. Bruce tried to remind himself that it was they who were miniaturized, that Superman was normal-sized, but it was no good: from his point of view, Superman was well over a thousand majestic feet tall. 

The voice of their alien kidnapper hissed and rustled through the hold, cruel and implacable, as Superman stared at the city below him, the millions of lives. Bruce tore his mind from the sight of Superman's acres of abdomen peeking out from beneath his tattered t-shirt--he had more important things to consider right now.

First: how had Superman gotten to the spaceship? 

Robots lurched from the shadows to grab at Superman with pincers and tentacles. He shook them off, but it was an effort: his movements weary. He stopped to catch his breath, glaring into the recesses of the hold and waiting for another attack.

Second: how could a millimeter-high Bruce Wayne help him?

**: : :**

The answer to Bruce's first question took place on Earth about a half hour ago, although he wouldn't know it for a while.

"I need an oxygen tank, a harness, and some kind of ramp."

General Lane barked orders and soldiers leaped into action. 

"Dr. Irons, what angle do you think is best for the ramp?" Superman asked as a flatbed truck was repurposed into action.

Irons looked appalled. "You're not thinking of _jumping into space._ "

"I'm not _thinking_ of it at all," Superman said, buckling the harness on. "I'm doing it."

Irons shook his head. "You need to hit twenty-four thousand miles an hour to make escape velocity. That's impossible."

"That's suicide, son," growled Lane. "You've never been clocked at more than six hundred. We can get men up there in--"

"--Not enough time," Superman cut him off. "I have to get up there _now._ " He squinted into the sky, zooming in on the spaceship that held everyone he cared about in the world--everyone who understood him at all. Jimmy. Lois. Mrs. Nyxly.

Bruce.

"I've never needed to go that fast," he told Sam Lane's worried face. "But I need to now. I'll make it."

A stunned-looking Irons helped him set the _ad hoc_ ramp at the best possible angle. "You're crazy," he said. "I like that." He clapped Superman on the shoulder. "Don't get yourself killed."

Clark grinned. "I have no intention of it."

Then he started to run toward the ramp.

He was calculating his approximate speed, timing the landscape rushing by, when he felt his shoes start to give way, the soles tearing off. He didn't slow down, running barefoot, picking up speed, the wind cutting his jeans like knives until he hit the ramp and went

up

and

away.

It wasn't enough, he realized as the Earth fell away beneath him, wind resistance disappearing as the air grew thin. It wasn't enough. He was slowing down, he was going to start falling soon, he wasn't going to make it. He was going to fail them all. Lose Metropolis. Lose Bruce. Desperate, he spotted a satellite and managed to get it underneath him, pushing off with all his strength, feeling a surge of exultation as finally reached the spaceship (all honeycombed octagons and snakey tentacles), found a fingerhold, and hung on with all his might. 

He was looking for a place to tear an entrance, fingers scrabbling across the greasy-textured metal looking for a flaw, when the tentacles coiled around him. 

A surge of blinding pain and everything went black as he felt himself being lifted into the ship.

**: : :**

"You are not of this world." The mechanical voice's purr was a thundering boom in the skies of bottled Metropolis. "You are valuable. Precious. You are wasted here. I will keep you safe."

Bruce whirled and ran from the hotel lobby, running for the elevators. Somehow the electricity was still running (an energy grid embedded in the floor of the bottle? he wondered, before reminding himself it didn't matter), and within moments he was out on the roof. The air was uncanny and still--not even a breath of wind. 

"The people of this world hate and fear you," the voice was continuing. "They turned against you because the unknown terrifies them. Not one person there can ever truly be your equal, and you know it. I give you a choice now: save this city or save Kandor, the city of your birth world." In one of the thousands of darkened bottles, a light came on, limning delicate alien towers. In a case next to it was a snow-white suit of some supple cloth, full-size. "Live forever with people who fear and despise you, or don the indestructible armor of the Kryptonians and join them as a lord among men. Choose."

Bruce stared up at the sky, resisted the urge to yell. 

"Clark," he said, quiet even in the stillness. "Clark Kent."

Superman's vast gaze snapped unerringly to where Bruce stood on the rooftop. Bruce lifted his hand in a wave and found that suddenly, he had no idea what to say. It all sounded desperately hokey: _I believe in you, I trust you_ , what was next, would he start singing "The Wind Beneath My Wings"? 

So he said nothing, just raised his hand and called Superman by his name, there in the eerie quiet under the glassed-in sky.

A smile touched Superman's bloodied lips, and he nodded, once.

Then he took off his shirt.

Bruce blinked at the sight of a gratifying amount of rippling muscles. "'Indestructible?" said Superman, turning to smash the case with the white suit in it. "Thanks for letting me know." He pulled out the pristine cloth and--oh my, he was reaching down toward his fly and--

Bruce craned his neck, but the stand Metropolis was placed on cut off any view below the waist, and he gave up with a small sigh. 

As Superman pulled the suit up to his neck, it closed up seamlessly, molding to his body. Bright primary colors spread through the cloth, radiating out from the heart until he was clad in red, blue, and yellow. "I don't choose between lives," Superman announced. "I'll fight you for all of them-- _all of them!_ " His voice broke suddenly into a yell as he glared at the ceiling. "And then they'll be sent home!"

"This is their home, they have no other," clicked the metallic voice as a form like a metallic centipede uncoiled from the shadows, looming over Superman. "Their worlds are gone. Krypton is gone. Soon Earth will be gone. Join the collection or die!"

For Bruce the final battle was an exercise in agonizing helplessness. He watched as John Corben--Metal-0--threw punch after punch at Superman. "Behind you!" Bruce yelled once, seeing a tentacle looming behind Superman, and Clark whirled unerringly to sever it with a laser gaze.

 _When he gets us out of here--_ It clearly was a question of _when_ , not _if_ \-- _I'll find some way to join him, some way to fight beside him, no matter what. A suit, something that distracts people from noticing I'm just a man, something that makes me **more** \--_

His mind was still leaping ahead, filled with fervent plans, when Superman's hand smashed into the bottle that held Metropolis and lifted out the Kryptonian rocket, now the size of a thimble in his giant hand. With a contemptuous flick, he sent the rocket speeding at the creature looming over him.

The creature howled as the rocket hit it like an indestructible bullet, and crystalline spikes bloomed from within it, shattering outward into a luminous snowflake, a snowflake that sang in an joyous alien language.

The last thing Bruce Wayne heard was Superman's weary, shaking voice telling the computer to return Metropolis. The last thing he saw was Clark bathed in golden light, the blood on his face limned with radiance, sinking to the floor as the world fell away.

**: : :**

"I have to make a suit." 

"Thank heavens you're safe, sir," Alfred said in relief as Bruce came bursting through the door. "I saw--"

"--I have to make a suit." Bruce was already rummaging through his desk, grabbing paper and pencil.

"Certainly, sir." Alfred was nothing if not game. "Double breasted, single-breasted...?"

"Not too heavily armored, I need to be able to move. With a cape, for intimidation. And a cowl. Like this." He sketched a figure with hasty strokes. Alfred blinked at the spike-like ears on top of the cowl. It should look ridiculous, but somehow it didn't.

"Very well, sir. When would you like this suit by?"

Bruce was doodling stylized bats onto the chest. "The end of the weekend at the latest."

Alfred cast him a sidelong glance to see if he was joking. "Oh dear."

**: : :**

"...so he's still up there," Bruce finished. He hadn't stopped working through his entire retelling: pulling out a ream of kevlar, sizing up swathes of leather. "I assume he's doing clean-up, checking on the other bottled cities, making sure the threat is contained by his Kryptonian tech. I think he can come back when he wants to, if he got there on his own power. I need to be ready when he gets back."

"'Ready'?" Alfred looked dubious for the first time since Bruce had returned to Gotham last year with wild ideas of hunting down criminals in the night.

"Ready to help him. To fight by his side."

"You...are aware this is a man who can run fast enough to break free of the Earth's gravity? A man who can get hit by a tank and laugh? I don't mean to be harsh, Master Bruce, but wouldn't your support be more useful in a less...front-line capacity?"

Bruce shook his head. "We have to be equals on the field. I can't charge into the fray like he can, but I can do other things. I can make up for the lack of firepower with strategy, tactics." His scissors slipped and he hissed in annoyance. "I _have_ to."

Alfred watched him for a long moment. "This is about more than putting in a good team effort, isn't it."

"Yes." Bruce bit out the word and bent back to work.

Alfred reached out for the scissors. "Allow me to cut the leather, sir. You work on modifying the boots."

Bruce shot him a grateful glance and let him take the scissors. "I just wish I could get some message to him, somehow. I don't think he has an email address up there."

Scraps of leather fell to the ground like rain as Alfred wielded the scissors. He frowned thoughtfully, then said, "I believe I might have a suggestion in that area."

**: : :**

Clark tripped over the Kryptonian syllables and grimaced, then tried again. This time the computer responded, chiming as if it were pleased at his progress. The lights dimmed to a comfortable level for the people of Randizullian, with their sensitive eyes, and Clark smiled to himself as he stepped out of the room.

It had taken him two days of work to go through the database and figure out what environment was best for each bottled world, to reserve rooms for cities with special needs. It was difficult to communicate with the inhabitants, but he had tried to make clear that he had their best interests in mind. Someday, he hoped, he could find new worlds for each of them.

 _New worlds..._ The sheer amount of information on the ship staggered him. He had access now to data about tens of thousands of worlds; the boy who had stared up at the mystery of the stars now had at his fingertips the proof of life strewn throughout the galaxy, even in other galaxies altogether.

He could even go there someday, travel the stars in the ship he had started to call his Fortress.

He looked out the window at the gentle blue-green curve below him, dotted with clouds, and couldn't help a wry smile. The universe was open to him in a way he'd never even dreamed of...and all he wanted to do was cherish this beautiful blue speck in the darkness, keep it safe.

The stars could wait, he supposed.

Stumbling over the unfamiliar syllables, he asked the ship to tap into the satellite transmissions from Earth and display them on the bank of monitors that lined the back wall. A cacophony of noise rattled from the speakers, and it took him a moment to remember the right words to turn down the volume. News, fashion shows, BBC documentaries, the Spice channel all jumbled together in a welter of images. After a moment, Clark said "Narrow feed to transmissions from the last forty-eight hours containing search term: Bruce Wayne."

All but four of the monitors faded to black. Three of the stories mentioned Bruce, but one actually had his face on the screen, and Clark narrowed in on that one.

"Gotham's native billionaire, Bruce Wayne, was actually in Metropolis when it was abducted, and he's here to give WGTH an exclusive interview."

Bruce was wearing an impeccable navy-blue suit with a scarlet tie, and Clark couldn't help but wonder for a moment if those colors were pre-meditated. The reporter was asking, "Given the fact that you've had some harsh words to say about Superman in the past, has your experience changed your view of him at all?"

Bruce flashed a raffish, sidelong smile at the reporter. "Well, Summer, a real man knows when to confess he was wrong. And I think it's time I admit that my criticisms of Superman may have been hasty and even ill-advised. There we were," he said dramatically, waving one hand in the direction of space, "Trapped on an alien spaceship, millimeters high, with no way to return home. But Superman came to save us--if I've heard correctly, he _jumped into space_ to save all of us. He fought for us all--not just the people of Earth, but for the thousands of worlds that had been stolen before us. That's heroism."

"People have reported that Superman stayed up on the spaceship. Do you think he plans to return, or will he leave Earth now?"

"I have no doubt he'll return," Bruce said firmly. "He may not be genetically human, but Earth is his home. I'm sure he's cleaning up and recovering. In fact, I suspect he has technology that will enable him to monitor television channels, and in case he does, I'd like to address him directly." He looked away from the reporter and straight into the camera, his facile smile fading and his voice lowering to something low and intimate. "Superman. You leaped into the unknown to face a monstrous foe and save us all, and we can never thank you enough. I just hope..." He swallowed and looked down for an instant. "I hope that someday I'll have the chance to make a leap of faith like you did, a chance to help you like you helped all of us."

The reporter wrapped up the story and Clark turned off the channel, letting silence fall across the ship once more. He looked out at the Eastern seaboard of the United States below him, lights glimmering on as dusk slowly descended, and felt a smile tugging at his face. He was pretty sure he wouldn't be needing a playboy billionaire to charge in like the cavalry and save him anytime soon, but there was a kind of comfort to knowing Bruce was sincere under all the exaggeration.

That Bruce was down there in that spreading gleam of lights, thinking of him--it was all the support Clark would ever need.


	7. Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce's second night out in his new suit, and the GCPD already has a nickname for him.  When "Batman" runs into a guy with a magic ring and finds himself on a team that includes the recently-returned Superman, events start to race out of control.

The man loping over the rooftops had a wry grin on his face as he listened to the bullhorns shouting down at him. Only his second night out in the suit, and already the Gotham City Police Department had a name for him. He'd been hoping they'd pick something a little more dramatic or threatening, but he supposed it was going to be his job to put the drama and threat into his name.

Bruce-- _Batman_ \--dodged the pitiless circle of light that sought to pin him down and continued to chase his fleeing suspect.

It moved like a cross between a beetle and a dog, skittering and bounding across the rooftops, and Bruce felt a shudder of visceral repulsion crawl down his spine. There was something uncanny going on here, something more than just the muggers and thugs he'd been taking down in his ninja clothing. The rumors he'd read about a man who could run at impossible speeds, the recent reports about some guy calling himself a "space policeman" with a magic ring--not to mention the incontrovertible physical reality of a man from another planet, a man Bruce had touched (had kissed)--

Things were changing on Earth, and Bruce wasn't going to get left behind just because he wasn't an alien, or magic, or a mutant.

Just like he wasn't going to get left behind by whatever this _thing_ was. He put on a burst of speed and tackled it, only to have it writhe out of his grip with incredible strength, its fist slamming against his jaw. Dazed and furious, Batman whirled--just in time to see the thing get whumped with a glowing green fire truck.

"Hi there," said a figure standing in mid-air, surrounded by a corona of emerald light. "You must be that Batman guy the police are after."

**: : :**

"The creature is not connected with Superman," said Batman. 

Green Lantern brandished his ring in something dangerously close to a rude gesture. "It's extraterrestrial, he's an alien, it seems likely there's a link."

"Superman isn't even on the planet," Batman growled. "He's still up in space--"

"--My ring tracked him as arriving back on Earth about four hours ago," Green Lantern said. "So let's go to Metropolis and find out what the deal is, huh?" He waved his hand and a shimmering green jet sprang into existence. "I'll even give you a lift. Unless you can flap your cape and fly there," he added, flopping his arms to illustrate. "That way you can have a ringside seat for Green Lantern's takedown of Superman!"

Batman swung into the luminous jet rather than show hesitation in front of a showboater who liked to refer to himself in the third person. It felt solid enough. The jet lifted into the air in an uncanny silence--Batman was surprised Green Lantern didn't make appropriate _vroom vroom_ sound effects--and soared toward Metropolis. Batman ignored several attempts at conversation, looking at lights below them.

Superman was back on Earth. Bruce-- _Batman_ \--was on his way to meet him, at the side of a man who was very likely to spark a confrontation. Not exactly an ideal introduction, Bruce mused.

However, if there was any chance this lunatic with the magic ring of unknown power might be able to overcome Superman, Batman wanted to be there to help Clark out.

**: : :**

_It seems he didn't need my help in this case,_ Batman thought ruefully as the Man of Steel advanced on him. Green Lantern was nowhere in sight, knocked maybe miles away by Superman's punch. Hands locked around his throat, and Superman growled, "You two are behind this attack? Your buddy almost killed everyone in this building when he blew up! What's going on?" There was no recognition in his eyes. 

Bruce tried to speak, but it only came out as a croak from a bruised windpipe. Superman's fingers started to relax, but then green chains appeared to wrap around Superman's form, squeezing him. Green Lantern was yelling insults and threats-- _that's definitely going to help_ , thought Bruce, Good work--and Superman was furious, with an edge under his voice that Bruce recognized as panic.

Superman shattered the chains; the shock wave of his fist hitting the ground drowned out Batman's voice once more. Bruce had to get control of this situation--he couldn't be seen as buffeted about by titanic powers, helpless. As the super-speed hero Green Lantern had paged arrived on the scene and distracted Superman for a moment, Batman stepped into the space between Superman and Green Lantern. "Stop this," he said, putting his hand on Superman's shoulder. "Please." 

His voice came out scraped and rough, gravelly, and Bruce wasn't surprised when Superman glared at him like a stranger. On the other hand, he couldn't help but notice there was a definite edge to his altered voice, and he made a mental note to see if he could replicate the effect later--without getting throttled, preferably.

"We're not working with the monsters," he continued. "We've all been attacked by them. We're all on the same side." 

It was amazing how quickly the anger drained out of Superman's face, leaving it distrustful, sullen--and a touch chagrined. He shrugged off Batman's hand, but his fury was gone. Flash and Green Lantern were chattering; Superman was frowning like a boy who found himself on the edge of a group he wanted to join, but wasn't sure if he was welcome. Bruce considered various ways he could tell Clark who he was, but he wasn't sure if it would be a good idea right now. First, it would definitely be a distraction, not to mention he'd risk revealing his identity to both of the other heroes. Also...well, he wasn't sure he wanted Superman to know he'd tried to strangle his friend. Not yet. 

Soon. Once there was a chance to breathe a little.

And then the next wave of assault hit them.

**: : :**

Clark punched another of the winged and armored monsters and tried to get his bearings. Things were moving too fast. He'd just come back to Metropolis only to find it under attack _again_. All he wanted to do was go find Bruce and tell him about the amazing things he'd found on Brainiac's ship, the boggling possibilities. He wanted to take Bruce back to the ship somehow, let him explore, watch the cold white light of the stars mingle with the warm blue glow of Earthlight on that aristocratic face. Instead, here he was, punching monsters side by side with an entire team of improbably-costumed heroes. It was just as well that Bruce was safely back in Gotham, or he'd insist on helping, and no matter how athletic and smart he was, Clark didn't think he'd stand a chance against these vicious gargoyle-machines.

But Superman didn't have to face them alone.

He remembered Brainiac's taunts about how he would always be alone in this world, then glanced over at the group of people fighting at his side. He'd gone from isolated to one of a group of people with powers in just a few hours. They all had some kind of augmented abilities: amazing speed, astonishing strength, the ability to control man-eating sharks, a magic ring, and--well, he wasn't sure what powers Batman had yet, but they _had_ to be impressive if he'd been willing to stand in between Superman and Green Lantern like that.

As Superman watched, Batman twisted away from clashing razor fangs to vault over a bronze-winged demon with an almost preternatural grace. Something about the way he moved tugged at Clark's memory, some connection nearly clicking into place--

And then the ground rocked and harsh light flooded the street like a hammer-blow. A figure that seemed carved from malign granite stepped onto the soil of Earth, and the ground seemed to cringe away from his footfalls.

The being--Darkseid, from his own corrupt lips--wasn't hateful, he was _Hate_. Clark could feel it emanating from him like steam from dry ice, a roiling miasma of cruelty that made his gut clench. Darkseid glanced at one of the military helicopters and beams of light stabbed from his eyes, congealed malice that obliterated the craft in an eyeblink.

Darkseid looked at Superman.

Flash was yelling something, he was pushing Clark away from the lancing crimson light, but the eyebeams _bent_ impossibly to follow them, homing in on them. Superman launched himself into the sky, dazed and awkward, still unsure of himself in the air, he still wasn't even sure how he was _doing_ it--the city reeled beneath him and the scarlet beam was faster that he was, it was catching up, it--

Agony exploded between his shoulder blades, under his breastbone, like his heart was bursting. It wasn't heat, it wasn't even pain, it was despair made solid that shattered him and sent him tumbling broken from the sky. He heard a shriek of triumph from above, and a demon's brazen claws seized him, piercing his shoulders and yanking him upward, away from his city, away from his world.

He glimpsed the scene below one last time, through a veil of scarlet mist: Flash's face blank with horror, Wonder Woman's contorted with fury. He saw Batman with one hand raised upward, his mouth open as if to call a name, and then it was all gone, blotted out in anguish.

**: : :**

A spray of droplets pattered on Batman's cowl, speckled his outstretched fingers with crimson. He watched his hand clench uselessly at the air and bit back a futile cry as Superman was borne away by one of the winged monsters, his torn body limp in its grasp. The sky was filled with people struggling in the grip of other demons, their cries shrill and hopeless, but Batman watched the battered figure in red and blue until it disappeared into the black clouds.

"Keep him busy," he said to the rest of the team as they picked themselves from the rubble. His voice was cold with fury, and he let that icy rage lash him onward. No time to think, only to act.

Green Lantern was still staggering to his feet. "Keep who busy?"

 _"Him._ " Batman pointed at the massive figure gazing out over the destruction.

"Gladly," said Wonder Woman, snapping her lasso between her hands with a grim smile.

"Back her up!" Batman yelled at a dazed-looking Green Lantern and Aquaman as she soared into battle. "I'm going after Superman!"

"You're _what_? Are you _crazy_?" Green Lantern's mouth hung open with a dismay that would be amusing under different circumstances. 

"Just go!" Batman gave Green Lantern a shove in the small of the back, pushing him toward where Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and the just-arrived cyborg kid were charging at Darkseid. Then he turned his back on the battle and ran.

In the shadows of a sagging parking garage he yanked off his cowl and detached his cape. Superman was being taken away to somewhere. He needed to be where Superman was. There seemed to be only one way to get there. The demons were fighting people in costumes, kidnapping people in civilian clothes: therefore, Bruce had to be a civilian again. Simple.

He ran up the ramp to the roof of the garage and threw his hands in the air, flagging down a flying demon like some satanic taxi. A monster stooped from the sky in a clamor of metal wings; there was an instant of panic as claws clamped around his wrists, but he tamped it down ruthlessly. He was the one in control of the situation, not the thing carrying him. He knew what he was doing.

He was going to save Clark.

**: : :**

Had he been here minutes or months? Clark couldn't tell anymore. Visions of worlds aflame, hope crushed into fragments, entire races in chains flickered and blazed through his mind, searing him more than the bonds of sullen light that penetrated his flesh. Despair was a lead weight on his chest, burrowing into his heart. He could break his chains, assault the leering figures that stooped over him--but to what purpose? He was alone on a world of sulphur and ashes, unimaginable distances from earth. No one could cross the light-years, infiltrate this hellish tower of iron and find him. No one would come for him. No one.

He heard himself choking on blood and grief, a small, lost sound among the howls of the damned ringing through the halls. No one would miss him--just one person, not even a human being, an alien. The thought wormed into his brain, devouring all hope: the gentle green and blue earth festered and dripped with maggots, the golden fields of Kansas weltered in filth and blood. His parents turned away from him, their smiles fading into disgust, receding into darkness. Everyone had feared and hated him, everyone who cared for him was dead and gone, this was all he had now, an eternity of suffering.

A word, a name, came to him through the crushing despair, and he seized at it like a spar: dark laughing eyes, a voice filled with self-mockery and affection. A promise: _Someday I'll leap into the unknown for you._ But it was impossible, it slipped away from him into the scarlet darkness, the inflection and rhythm of it lost under the tormented sounds in his ears, the tumult in his heart. Only the mockery remained, turned outward to cut at him like bitter blades. His hopes were feeble and foolish, a last taunting cruelty. Better to let them go entirely, to let faith fall into ashes like the lie it was. He knew now that Bruce would laugh to see him here, stripped of his pride, powerless at last. With a final stab of panic, he realized he could no longer recall Bruce's eyes or the curve of his mouth; the face in his memory receded into blankness and pain.

Despair obliterated him like a wave, a crash of surf on an endless aching shore, seeking to sweep him into its depths forever. He struggled against it, but he was alone, and he had nothing left to hold on to. Images filled his mind of himself kneeling at Darkseid's feet, emptied of volition, an instrument only of Darkseid's malignant will. Visions of himself at Darkseid's right hand, turning the tide of the battle into darkness, crushing out the light of Earth, the light of a thousand suns. This was his destiny, there was no escape.

 _No_ , he thought, through the pain that negated all he was. There remained one way to thwart Darkseid's design. One way to prevent that future. He narrowed his world to that thought, the only one left to him.

One final way.


	8. Apokolips

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Batman comes to Apokolips to rescue Superman.

The broken cinders of a million bones crunched and sifted under Bruce Wayne's boots as he ghosted through the fire-lit halls of Darkseid's world. The ground was uncomfortably hot even through the thick soles of his boots, and he didn't dare to pause for long as he made his way deeper into the vast necropolis. There was a stench hanging in the air, cold and rotting in his nostrils, clinging to his clammy skin: a reek of despair and hopelessness. His skin crawled as if it were trying to shake off the very air, and he could feel his steps slowing, lagging despite his urgency. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to move forward into the blood-soaked shadows, toward the center of the ragged maze of iron. He couldn't turn back. The world needed Superman.

Clark needed him.

He had a spare cowl in his belt--useless as armor, but it would at least protect his identity. He knew he should probably pull it on, but pragmatism was outweighed by something else, something irrational and undeniable.

Unmasked, he moved deeper into hell.

He heard it before he saw it: a high, electric hum that flayed the air. Under it were hoarse voices, their words indistinct, but the cruelty and glee in them cuttingly clear. Batman moved closer, his heart pounding, sidling around a corner to peer into a room lit only by a scarlet radiance that bathed the faces of the two men bending over Superman's contorted body.

Superman's muscles were rigid, his unseeing eyes held open by spikes of light, his face locked into a silent scream by glowing lines that fastened to his mouth like a horse's bit.

Bruce managed to tear his eyes away from the sight of Superman bound and suffering to take in the two figures leaning over him. Fury surged in him as he took their measure: neither human, all teeth and claws and numinous malice. One of them ran a jagged hand down Superman's chest, giggling with delight as Clark choked and convulsed under his touch, and Bruce felt an unholy desire to leap forward and throttle him, even to die trying--no, he reminded himself, that wouldn't save Clark. He breathed the corrupted air deeply and tried to will himself to calm once more. He needed a distraction, something to draw away the torturers and give him time--

There was a deep, almost sub-sonic _boom_ , and a chaotically swirling portal opened up behind the torturers, who were flung by a concussion across the room. Bruce held on to the pitted iron of the wall with his fingertips, feeling his body buffeted by the shock wave. Within the portal stood Darkseid, parrying a fierce attack from the Amazon warrior with contemptuous ease, while the other heroes rallied for another attack.

Bruce would have considered it a miracle if he believed in them; as it was he lost no time in leaping forward into the confusion and making his way to the bound figure.

The wires of light piercing Clark's body came away like tissue paper in his hands. He gathered them up in handfuls and they shattered on his gauntlets with a malicious clatter.

"Superman," he rasped in a voice that seemed scraped raw by swallowed screams. He grasped the blue-clad shoulders, shaking them. No response. The sky-blue eyes still were locked on eternity, unseeing. He took the rictus-frozen face in his hands as if trying to smooth the agony from it. _"Clark._ "

**: : :**

Vile images swirled around Clark, searing his mind and soul: the rotting corpses of his parents shambling toward him; Metropolis soaked with rancid blood; Gotham in flames. A raven's croak of a voice called his name, and Clark could see Bruce's face, haunted and fire-lit, doomed and damned along with him. There was a ring of bruises on his neck, a string of fingerprints like black pearls, and his eyes said that it was Clark who had done this to him, had hurt and betrayed him. It was too much for Clark to bear, and he flung his hand out to dispel the vision, to disperse it like smoke rather than allow Bruce's anguished face to taunt him further. "You're not real," he said. "Leave me to die in peace, you're not--"

His feebly waving hand came up against skin. He could feel the fine strong bones of a jaw under his fingers, the pulse leaping beneath his thumb.

"--Real," he finished, faltering. "You're not. Not here. You can't be."

Bruce leaned into his touch, the weight solid and palpable against his palm. A smile touched his mouth. "I told you I'd save you if I ever had the chance," he murmured, his raw voice barely carrying over the shrieks and clamor of battle.

He turned his head and kissed the palm of Clark's hand, and only then could Clark begin to believe that this was real.

"How are you--How did you--"

Bruce shook his head at the stammered words, his eyes still fixed on Clark's face. "We need you. The world needs Superman." He took a breath. "And I need you. I would go to hell itself to bring you back. I will never abandon you. Never."

Clark blinked up at Bruce's fierce eyes, his form limned with brimstone light, and felt strength and resolve returning to his limbs. However Bruce had gotten here, they were here together, and that was enough. He struggled to sit up, Bruce's arms going around his shoulders. "What's happening--"

His eyes fell on the struggle, Darkseid's implacable form with the other heroes breaking upon it like waves, behind them the portal a circle of cryptic light. He saw a glimmer of Earth's clean golden sunlight on the other side of the portal and felt his eyes kindle into fury.

This time flying was as natural as breathing. He launched himself at the flinty figure who threatened his world.

They grappled there in the portal, Darkseid's arms a vice to crush his heart, impossible colors blazing around them. But his heart couldn't be crushed: Bruce had come for him, his team was here for him, his world needed his help. He heard someone yell "Batman?" and looked over to see a figure in a cowl--no, he realized with a giddy shift of double vision, it was _Bruce_ \--running for the portal, and Clark hurled Darkseid from him back into Hell. There was a sound like a thousand doors slamming shut, a glare of white light--

\--And Darkseid was gone, the hellscape was gone, they were back on a normal battered city street.

There were people cheering somewhere, their voices a mist of joy. Superman tried to take a step forward and Batman caught him as his legs buckled, supported him. "You came for me," he whispered.

"I owed you one." It was definitely Bruce's voice, rough with pain and emotion.

"Okay," Superman said, as the buzzing in his ears increased and the shouting crowds receded into a strange humming distance. "It's my turn next, then."

And then the world faded away--slowly, gently, into a painless pale silence.

**: : :**

He woke up to birdsong and rich azure-laced sunlight. He was lying, still fully in costume, in a wide white bed, the headboard made of a dark wood intricately carved with leaves and flowers.

He sat up, catching a glimpse of his startled face in the bureau mirror. Where was he? A more careful look at the headboard revealed a family crest hidden among the woodwork--an ornate "W."

His fingers traced the wood for a moment, touching the curves of the Gothic letter.

A gentle footstep at the door made him turn his head. Bruce's butler--Pennyworth, that was the name--was in the doorway, only one raised eyebrow betraying his surprise. "It's good to see you awake, sir," he said. "Allow me to inform Master Bruce. He'll be up in a moment."

He vanished before Clark could ask any questions, leaving Clark blinking at the closing door.

A moment later and he heard footsteps running on the floor below him. They pelted across wood, then marble, then took the stairs two at a time. A brief pause, and then the door swung open and Bruce strolled into the bedroom, looking so cool and unrushed that Clark couldn't help but smile. "Alfred said you were awake," Bruce noted, wandering over to the bureau and brushing invisible specks of dust from the gleaming mahogany, not meeting Clark's eyes. "I hope you're feeling better."

"You," Clark breathed, and Bruce's head came up at the admiration in his voice, their eyes meeting in the bureau mirror. "What _are_ you?"

Bruce looked away from his gaze, back at the dark wood. "I'm just...someone who wants a chance to make the world a little better," he said. "And who has had a _lot_ of free time and a _lot_ of money," he added wryly.

"You came for me," Clark said, and felt his eyes stinging, his voice breaking shamefully, "I'd given up, I'd lost hope, but you--"

"You? Given up?" All of the playboy ease vanished from Bruce's posture; he strode to the side of the bed and seized Clark's hands, his eyes blazing. "Not you. Never. I knew you'd die first. That's why I had to come for you." He shook his head. "I know you, and I know you never give up. I was hoping--" His voice faltered, "--I was hoping we could...not give up together."

The awkward, limping conclusion dragged a chuckle out of Clark; when Bruce joined in it swelled into a full-blown laugh. Clark held onto Bruce's hands and let honest, infectious laughter cleanse the last remnants of horror from his memory. 

"It would be an honor and a pleasure," Clark finally managed, "to never give up with you."

Bruce lifted his hands to his lips for a long moment. Then the focus of his gaze shifted to Clark's chest. "I couldn't get this outfit off of you--to check for injuries, of course, nothing salacious. Besides," he went on with a waggle of eyebrows, "I already saw most of you when you stripped bare in front of all of Metropolis."

Clark felt his cheeks burning. "I didn't have time for modesty," he harrumphed. He cleared his throat and aimed for 'nonchalant.' "Um, how much could you--"

Bruce paused long enough to make Clark turn even redder before sighing and saying, "Nothing below the waist, alas. _Such_ a missed opportunity." He looked thoughtful. "It's a very good thing that I don't have penis anxiety, because based on my _ad hoc_ calculations..." He pursed his lips and tilted his head, musing: "You were about five times the height of the _Daily Planet_ building, and that's nine hundred feet, making you--in relative terms--about forty-five hundred feet tall, which means...it was about the size of a city block?" Bruce whistled admiringly and slid one hand down Clark's arm toward his chest. "Of course, I can't be _sure_ until I know how long the real and non-hypothetical item is..."

"--You weren't _really_ thinking about that while I was fighting Brainiac."

"I am capable of impressive feats of multitasking," Bruce responded blandly. His hand had reached Clark's chest and was wandering lazily across the golden "S." "So to get back to the original topic, how does one remove this delightfully gaudy piece of clothing?" He looked indignant at Clark's expression. "I wish to bathe your wounds, my hero." 

He left Clark's side and returned in a moment with a basin of steaming water and a soft cloth, announcing, "Your Florence Nightingale has returned. Now," he leered in a most un-nurselike fashion, "Show me how to take off your clothes."

Clark was getting used to never knowing for certain when Bruce was teasing and when he was serious. "It's apparently something called Kryptonian psionicloth."

"Psionicloth." Bruce nodded, deadpan. "I see. Of course."

"I can control the strands of fabric at a molecular level with my mind." Clark raised his arm and the suit began to unravel from the wrist down, the cloth shimmering out of existence with a sound of tiny crystal bells. 

Bruce's eyes widened. Clark started to re-integrate the cloth, and he made a sulky face. "So you're saying your clothes can't come off unless you tell them to?"

"Basically, yes."

Bruce ran a cautious hand along his blue-clad ribs. "Where are you hurt?" 

"I'm mostly recovered," Clark said a little breathlessly as supple fingers traced his ribcage, then shifted to the dip of his navel. "But a little to the left is pretty tender still." As Bruce shifted his hand, Clark concentrated, and Bruce's fingers slid effortlessly _through_ the cloth to touch the skin beneath.

Bruce gasped. After hesitating a moment, he dabbled his fingers in the cloth like water. "I can feel the strands," he said. "Like infinitely fine silk between my fingers. Amazing." He put his hand all the way through, resting his palm against Clark's skin. "May I see?"

Clark let the fabric part like a curtain at Bruce's touch to reveal a mottled bruise. "Ah," Bruce said. "Let me." Reaching for the steaming cloth, he sponged the sweat and soot off Clark's skin, and Clark couldn't help a sigh of relief. "Told you I was a good nurse," murmured Bruce as he wrung out the cloth and re-wet it. "I learned from the best."

Deft fingers returned to the gap in Superman's uniform, coaxing at the edges until they unraveled at his touch, cascading backwards to reveal more bruised and scratched skin. As Clark relaxed, the fabric grew more supple and malleable, shifting like sand under Bruce's touch, allowing him to clean all of Clark's torso bit by bit. Clark closed his eyes and relished the feeling, but his dreamy reverie was broken at the sensation of Bruce's mouth pressed against his bare shoulderblade.

"Mm," Bruce murmured as Clark's eyes snapped open. Deft fingers slipped through alien cloth to brush a nipple, and Clark could feel Bruce's smug smile against his skin as he gasped. "How small can you make this uniform?" Bruce mused.

"I plan on mostly keeping it on as briefs under my civilian clothes," said Clark, "But if I want-- _ah,_ " said Clark as Bruce shifted his mouth to where his fingers had been, "--it can fold down into a little scrap of super-dense cloth and leave me, um, totally naked."

"If you want?" Bruce's voice was amused; his tongue darted out and Clark groaned. "And do you want?"

Clark wanted.

Clark wanted very much indeed.

**: : :**

Later, lying in each others' arms, Clark could feel Bruce's shoulders shaking against him with muffled laughter. "What is it?" he whispered, nuzzling Bruce's neck.

"A city block?" Bruce's voice was filled with affectionate admiration. "You could have warned me that I was vastly underestimating you."

"Mm," Clark murmured. "Considering how much you let me underestimate _you_ , it seems only fair."

"Well, don't do it again." Bruce's voice was sleepy; he laced his legs through Clark's and pulled him closer. "I know I certainly won't."

Clark picked up the tiny piece of white cloth that was his costume from the nightstand. With a flick of his wrist, it unfolded into a silken sheet that settled down on them like snow. As it touched their skin, colors bled across it: red and blue tangled with dappled black and yellow, patterns chasing and embracing each other across the cloth.

Wrapped in shifting colors, they slept.


	9. Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Justice League begins to make plans for a satellite.  Superman and Batman already have one, of course.

"This'll be so cool," said Green Lantern, coming up behind Flash and Batman and slinging his arms around both their shoulders. "Like a treehouse in space." They both turned their heads to glare at him; after a moment Green Lantern gingerly removed his arm from Batman's shoulder. "Course, Superman's already got his own super-special-secret-Fortress." He grinned at Superman over the table full of blueprints. "How's about we all crash there until the Watchtower is built? You can fly in some kegs and pizza, rent some DVDs--"

"I don't think so," said Superman mildly, looking down at the plans. "Fortress of _Solitude_ , remember?"

"Ah yes." Green Lantern cast his eyes toward the ceiling. "The endless solitude of The Superman, alone in space, with none to understand his titanic isolation. Such sorrow!" He clutched at his heart until Flash kicked him. "Come on, Supes, you can't just sit there moping all the time."

Superman was still looking down at the table, a very slight smile on his face. "Oh, I have no intention of it," he murmured.

**: : :**

The airlock swung silently open and Superman steered the metal capsule into the hatch. As air entered the lock and the artificial gravity came on, it settled to the floor like a drifting leaf. "I still can't believe you had a space capsule sitting around," Superman said as the door hissed open and Batman stepped out.

"Doesn't everyone?" Batman said, looking around the airlock with intense interest. "I mean, you never know when there might be a chance at space flight, and you have to be ready." He tugged off his cowl, revealing Bruce Wayne's tousled hair and shining eyes. "And see, it turned out it was a good thing, too."

Clark shook his head as he opened the inner door. "Welcome to my home away from home," he said, ushering Bruce in with a flourish of scarlet cape.

Bruce stopped dead as they entered the observatory, staring out at the glowing blue Earth below them, the endless stars beyond. He took a long, shaking breath. "My God," he murmured. He reached out and put his hand on Clark's shoulder; Clark could feel the faint tremor in it. "I wasn't sure I'd ever live to see the Earth from space, and now here I am with my alien boyfriend--my alien boyfriend from Kansas," he corrected himself at Clark's look, "--in his spaceship. In space." He shook his head. "I'm really glad I got to see it here first, not on the League satellite with all of the team, but alone with you..." A hint of a mischievous smile glinted through his earnest look. "It will make it easier to act cool and blase when we go to the Watchtower for the first time."

Clark couldn't help laughing. "I didn't know you were an astronomy buff."

"Clark, I was an _everything_ buff. But astronomy--well. I studied karate and psychology and chemistry and engineering because they would help me make Gotham a better place. I studied astronomy because...I loved the stars. The hope and the wonder of them." 

He wasn't looking at the Earth anymore, he was looking at Clark. Clark kissed him--a light, lingering kiss that was a promise of more--and said, "Let me show you the cities."

The bottles glowed with life, row on row. Bruce looked at the delicate fluted spires, the soft adobe-colored walls, the steel monoliths. "All of their planets are gone?"

"All of the ones I've been able to track. I still can't communicate well with about half of them."

"Any luck finding new homes?"

"I have a lead on a planet that could hold Vell'ut," said Clark. "But for most of them...the right atmosphere, gravity, natural resources, the right combination is hard to come by." He shot a glance at Bruce. "Once I figure out how to use the individual miniaturizer, it might be possible to visit some of them." Bruce's eyes widened. "I'm hoping to enter Kandor when I get the chance. I was hoping...well, that is...it would be an honor if you'd come with me."

"The honor would be entirely mine," Bruce murmured. His expression shifted from awed to appalled as a thought struck him. "I'd better be picking up my Kryptonian studies!"

Clark laughed. "I'm still working on a way to code the psionicloth to human genetics, by the way. Once I get that working you can have a suit made from it, if you like."

"Matching suits, I like it," Bruce said, prowling around the ship. He stopped in front of the banks of glowing screens, each showing a different scene from around the world. "Any luck finding Luthor?"

Clark shook his head as he adjusted one of the screens. "He's gone to ground, and I'm pretty sure he won't be showing his face for a while, now that the Justice League is active. Maybe he won't bother us again."

Bruce's snort showed his opinion about that possibility.

"Ah, there we go," said Clark, as the screen he was working on cleared to show a team of brightly-dressed teens in helmets and wing-like capes. "I knew that must be playing somewhere."

"I'm never going to live down my confession that I loved that show, am I?"

Clark murmured something in Kryptonian and the monitor seat shifted and elongated into a slightly larger form. "I was more of a Gundam kid myself. No accounting for tastes." He patted the seat next to him.

Bruce settled down next to him with an elaborate smirk. "There's no need to apologize, Clark. They were a team of _scientist ninjas_. Of course they were the best."

"Scientist ninjas who dressed up as birds, no less."

"Bats aren't birds," Bruce pointed out.

"Close enough," Clark retorted, nuzzling his neck, and Bruce decided to concede the point. 

After a moment, his nose wrinkled. "Clark, do I smell...pizza?"

"Oh!" Clark sprang up from the alien sofa and flew out of the room, returning with a slightly scorched pizza. "Sorry, Brainiac apparently didn't know how to cook it right."

Bruce cocked an eyebrow at the woeful pizza. "What, no keg?"

"I can go get one," Clark said, straightening quickly. "Would you--"

"--I was joking. Joking." 

"It's just that I'd like everything to be perfect because this is--well, it's sort of, in a way--"

"--Our first date?"

"Well, assuming me kidnapping you and dangling you off a bridge doesn't count. Nor does you coming to Apokolips to rescue me from brainwashing and torture, I don't think. So this is kind of it." Clark looked around the satellite, rubbing the back of his head with chagrin. "Now that I think about it, watching _anime_ and eating pizza is a pretty mundane first date, isn't it? I'm sorry."

Bruce couldn't help but laugh. "Clark, any date set on a spaceship looking down at Earth is by definition _not mundane._ " He took Clark's arm and drew him down onto the silvery couch once more. "And you could never be," he murmured.

A small robot scurried around to the front of the couch, holding aloft the burned pizza like the Olympic flame. Bruce picked up a slice and settled into the weird shifting fabric, hooking one leg around Clark's. The field of glittering screens pulsed and glowed around the _anime_ , showing a world free of crises for the moment.

Superman and Batman ate pizza, watched television, and kept an eye on the Earth, and for a few hours the Fortress of Solitude was anything but.


End file.
